According to a report from PWInsider.com, on October 5th, Judge Vanessa L. Bryant of the United States District Court of Connecticut ruled that the lawsuits brought against the WWE by the estate of the late Nelson Frazier Jr. (Big Daddy V/Mabel/Viscera) and Michelle James, the mother of the late Matt Osbourne’s (Doink The Clown) children be consolidated into one case alongside the lawsuits brought against the company by former stars including Billy Jack Haynes, Vito LoGrasso, Evan Singleton, Ryan Sakoda, Matt Wiese (Luther Reigns) and Russ McCullough over the WWE’s alleged lack of protection when it comes to performers in regards to their health, specifically concussions, CTE and other head-trauma related injuries.
The report notes that WWE filed a motion asking for the court to expedite their interest in learning who any additional former talents that may be planning to file lawsuits against the company might be, based on communication they received from attorney Konstantine Kyros and that Kyros then filed an amended complaint against the WWE, eliminating any others and that initially, the court decided that they would go ahead with WWE’s wish to expedite information, but went back and ruled that they were only speaking about the existing cases brought against the WWE and not the lawsuit that WWE have brought against named including Blackjack Mulligan, Tom “Dynamite Kid” Billington and others and that the court has still to make a final determination on that matter and that WWE have until November 20th to respond to the amended complaint.
The report notes that the attorneys of Blackjack Mulligan, Dynamite Kid, Ivan Koloff and Koko B. Ware filed a motion to dismiss WWE’s case against them, claiming that WWE’s argument that their claims would be time-barred under existing WWE contract could not be correct as 3 of the 4 never had such deals and that WWE have until November 20th to respond to that motion, while the company has until October 16th to argue that Connecticut law be applied to the lawsuit involving Billy Jack Haynes, who himself has until October 30th to respond and that WWE have also filed with the court their intentions to bring motions to dismiss the lawsuits brought by Singleton and McCullough listed above.
WWE issued a statement on the matters back in July which read, “It is unfortunate that some former performers have been improperly recruited under the guise of a “big payday” and we feel badly that these individuals are being misled and exploited.”