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The American singer Lizzo has asked for the dismissal of a lawsuit alleging harassment and discrimination brought by her former tour wardrobe stylist.
Attorneys for the 35-year-old singer have filed a move to dismiss Asha Daniels’ lawsuit, referring to the 35-year-old stylist and clothes designer as a “disgruntled” worker.
According to court records that People was able to get, Lizzo’s legal team filed the request on Friday, claiming that the complaint is “meritless and salacious.”
Daniels “failed to perform the work that she was assigned and, eventually, just played hooky and refused to show up for work,” according to her counsel.
Following Lizzo’s lawsuit from a number of former dancers who claimed to have experienced hostile work environments, sexual harassment, and fat shaming, Asha filed her own complaint against the singer.
According to the paperwork, Asha was fired for ‘abandoning her duty’ at Lizzo’s Paris, France, event.
The attorneys are citing two reasons for the dismissal: it was filed in the wrong location, and Daniels ‘is a New York resident who worked for a Delaware corporation in Europe’ and thus the designer ‘has alleged no nexus to California.’
Asserting that the dismissal was Lizzo’s legal team’s “another Hail Mary to try to shift blame to the victims, as she has done to the three other plaintiffs who have sued her for similar allegations of harassment, disability discrimination, and retaliatory termination,” Asha’s attorney Ron Zambrano issued a statement following the request.
He went on, ‘Lizzo and her lawyers can continue trying to rationalize her illegal and wretched conduct but we remain committed to seeking justice for our clients, and look forward to our day in court where Lizzo can explain her behavior in a public forum.’
In September Asha opened up about the singer’s alleged ‘sexualized, racially charged, and illegal work environment’ – claiming that she was ‘physically assaulted,’ ‘threatened,’ and told she wasn’t allowed to eat by her manager.
Fashion designer Asha sued the celebrity, claiming that throughout her time working for Lizzo, her manager, Amanda Nomura, mistreated her both physically and verbally.
She made the claims a month after three of the hitmaker’s backup dancers accused her of a number of startling things.
The 24 year old Crystal Williams, 25-year-old Noelle Rodriguez, and 26-year-old Arianna Davis, the former backup dancers, said they were made to attend demeaning sex displays and endured other uncomfortable circumstances as part of their employment with the celebrity.
Asha opened up about some of the terrible things she claims she went through while working for Lizzo in an interview with ABC News for an Impact x Nightline segment.
‘I’m coming into work with someone who has physically assaulted me, someone who has threatened me, someone who is not allowing me to go eat when I need to eat,’ she alleged in a sneak peak of the sit-down, obtained by The Wrap, seemingly referring to Amanda.
She alleged that Amanda not only said horrible things about her, but about the Good as Hell songstress as well.
‘Amanda would regularly mock both Lizzo and the big girls. She would refer to them as “fat,” just a bevy of really inappropriate things like, “Useless, lazy,”‘ she continued.
‘She would do like a stereotypical black impersonation of them. I even told her, “This is actually really offensive,” and she just laughed it off.’
Asha said she was hired to design outfits for Lizzo and her dancers on her The Special Tour earlier this year, but claimed she was ‘wrongfully terminated’ just two weeks in.
At the time Lizzo’s spokesperson denied Asha’s claims, pointing out that she ‘never actually met or even spoke to’ the star.
However, as a ‘business owner’ herself, Asha told ABC News host Janai Norman that she thinks Lizzo is in-part ‘responsible’ for what she endured.
‘I’m a business owner myself, I was so shocked that Lizzo’s workplace wasn’t in line with who we know as the star Lizzo,’ she concluded.
‘I can say in my own life, I’m responsible for the people who work for me and work on my projects, and I think that everybody else is too.’
In her suit, Asha claimed that she alerted Lizzo’s management team about Amanda’s alleged behavior but said that the singer’s tour manager, Carlina Gugliotta, advised her to privately film Amanda’s conduct.
She said she didn’t follow her suggestion because she found it ‘both unethical and possibly unlawful,’ and was fired soon after.
She is now suing for sexual and racial harassment, in addition to disability discrimination. She is asking for damages which include unpaid wages, loss of earnings, and others.
