Justin Baldoni Accuses Blake Lively and Team of ‘Faking’ Lawsuit to Gain Private Info in USD 400 Million Feud

Earlier this year, U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman referred to the ongoing lawsuits involving Blake Lively, Justin Baldoni, and their publicists as a feud between PR firms. However, recent filings suggest the dispute may be more serious than initially believed. On Thursday, Baldoni’s legal team filed new claims against his former PR firm Jonesworks and its founder Stephanie Jones.

Bryan Freedman, Baldoni’s lawyer, said, “We are just starting to scratch the surface of a much broader and more insidious scheme.” He accused Jones and her company of misconduct related to the handling of data taken from a publicist’s confiscated phone as per the Deadline.

The dispute centers around text messages and other data allegedly taken from publicist Jennifer Abel’s phone after she left Jonesworks in 2023. According to Freedman, the data was released under the guise of a subpoena in a lawsuit filed by a company called Vanzan, believed to be affiliated with Blake Lively and her husband Ryan Reynolds.

Freedman claimed the September 2024 lawsuit was a 'sham' used to obtain subpoena power. “To suggest, as Vanzan (Lively and Reynolds) do in their secret ‘complaint’, that they are unaware of the identities of their own employees and contractual counterparties is a complete joke,” he said.

The lawsuit, Vanzan v. Does 1–10, named no defendants and was never assigned a judge. A dismissal notice was filed on December 19, just one day before Lively submitted a sexual harassment and retaliation complaint to California’s Civil Rights Department.

Kristen Tahler, the lawyer for Jones and Jonesworks, dismissed the new filings by Justin Baldoni’s team, saying their decision not to amend the original USD 400 million lawsuit showed how weak their case was.

She described it as a desperate move, claiming they had reversed course, dropped previously touted claims, presented no new evidence, and released a long and confusing statement, actions she believed suggested they knew they were in trouble. Tahler added, “Behind their empty gusto you’ll find not even an attempt to defend the misdeeds laid bare by the evidence.”

The amended claims filed Thursday also accuse Jones of warning a departing employee not to work with Abel, saying her business wouldn’t be around much longer. Freedman alleges this warning happened on the same day the Vanzan lawsuit was filed.

Freedman stated that Baldoni’s team was unaware of the lawsuit or subpoenas until recently. He said they will continue the fight to expose and hold the wrongdoers accountable and uncover the truth.

With the trial set for March 9, 2026, the legal battle around It Ends With Us and its PR teams shows no signs of cooling down. Lively, Reynolds, publicist Leslie Sloane and The New York Times are now seeking to be dismissed from Baldoni’s USD 400 million defamation lawsuit.

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