Vin Diesel managed to have a court dismiss four claims, from an erstwhile assistant named Asta Jonasson against him, related to employment discrimination. He continues to face two more allegations, of wrongful termination and sexual battery.
In her lawsuit filed in 2023, Jonasson claimed that Diesel pressed her back against a wall at a hotel before masturbating in her presence in 2010. The reported year of the incident would usually place it out of the stipulated time to file a lawsuit, known as the statute of limitations. However, California Governor Gavin Newsom approved an act that would revive some expired sexual assault allegations dating as far back as 2009.
That said, the Fair Employment and Housing Act requires a plaintiff to register an administrative complaint with the California Civil Rights Department for bringing a lawsuit. On Tuesday, Judge Daniel M Crowley ruled that the act of law that extends the aforesaid statute did not take the last date to register an administrative complaint beyond one year. Consequently, the judge ruled that the statute made the claims under the said act invalid.
“Plaintiff’s FEHA claims are time-barred because she failed to timely exhaust her administrative remedies by filing a CRD complaint within one year of the alleged adverse action, a jurisdictional requirement for a FEHA lawsuit,” wrote the judge.
There are allegations from Jonasson of wrongful termination, retaliation, sexual battery, negligent supervision and retention as well as infliction of emotional distress. The judge's ruling did not impact these claims because they do not carry a prerequisite to register an administrative complaint.
Bryan Freedman, Diesel's lawyer, denied the allegations at the time of filing.
“There is clear evidence which completely refutes these outlandish allegations,” Freedman said back then.