Four years after Jon and Kate’s TV marriage ended in a bitter divorce, the duo are still fighting it out in court. In August, Kate blindsided her ex with a multi-million-dollar hacking, wiretapping and identity thefy lawsuit, and now he’s hitting back with a motion to dismiss what he calls a “fishing expedition” by the mother of his octo-brood.
RadarOnline reported that Kate’s lawsuit accused Jon and Kate tell-all author Robert Hoffman of illegally accessing her computer, email, and bank accounts.
New court documents filed by Jon’s lawyers in Pennsylvania on October 22 lay out point by point why Jon is asking a judge to dismiss her claims against him. (Kate has already dismissed four of her eight original claims, after Jon filed an earlier motion to dismiss in September.)
First, the documents allege, Kate’s complaint “consists of little more than threadbare recitals of” her accusations, and little in the way of explanation. Claiming that Kate did not provide “sufficient factual allegations to demonstrate” the truth of her claims, the documents say that her complaint “is too vague” because she did not specify which computer or online accounts were accessed, when they were accessed, or how information needed to accomplish the access was obtained. Kate’s claims, the documents allege, “are pure speculation, a fishing expedition, and should be treated as such.”
Perhaps more importantly, according to the documents, Kate decided to make these claims after the statute of limitations had passed. She first publicly mentioned suspicions that Jon was accessing her personal information in 2009, and the statute of limitations for such claims is two years. “Now, nearly four years later, [Kate] has apparently determined that the time is right [to sue] but it is too late,” the documents allege, and as such, her claims should be dismissed.
Finally, according to the motion, if Kate wishes to sue for violation of privacy, she must admit that the allegations found in Hoffman’s book, Kate Gosselin: How She Fooled The World, which was allegedly written with improperly obtained information, are true. Kate has called the book “defamatory and untrue,” so, the motion argues, she “disproves her [own] claim.”
Hoffman filed his own motion to dismiss referring to the same arguments laid forth on Jon’s motion.
