A Los Angeles judge had about a million reasons for shooting down Jennifer McBride’s lawsuit against Lady Gaga.
On Monday, Superior Court Judge Holly J. Fujie took less than 10 minutes to address a lawsuit filed by the woman who returned the “Judas” singer’s stolen French bulldogs in 2021. McBride had sued the Grammy winner for the $500,000 reward, plus $1.5 million in additional damages, alleging she suffered emotional distress.
Last year, McBride, 53, pleaded no contest when she was charged with receiving stolen property. She claimed that she came across the dogs tied to a pole and asked about the $500,000 reward offered by Lady Gaga for their safe return, police said at the time.
Investigators found that she was in a relationship with the father of one of the men accused of assaulting Gaga’s dog walker, Ryan Fischer, who was shot in the chest, choked and beaten during the dognapping. McBride was later arrested.
McBride had filed an initial lawsuit that Fujie batted down, but she was given 20 days to file an amended complaint.
Fujie ruled Tuesday that McBride had failed to remedy the lawsuit and had “unclean hands” when attempting to cash in on the $500,000 reward.
McBride argued that the hefty reward was promised with “no questions asked.” Fujie ruled that “no one can take advantage of his own wrong. The unclean hands doctrine demands that a plaintiff act fairly in the matter for which he seeks a remedy.”
McBride claimed in the amended complaint that she was “in no way involved in the theft of Lady Gaga’s bulldogs and had no knowledge of said theft or its planning before its occurrence.” She also claimed that she only “took possession of [Lady Gaga’s] bulldogs for the specific purpose of ensuring their protection and safely returning them.”
Judge Fujie noted in the ruling that although McBride had claimed she was not involved in planning the dognapping, she didn’t deny that, at the time she attempted to cash in on the $500,000, she knew that the bulldogs were stolen from Lady Gaga.
The ruling stated that although McBride claimed that her motivation was to protect the bulldogs (and also to collect $500,000), “this alleged motivation does not negate her guilt of the charge because she has admitted receiving the bulldogs with knowledge that they were stolen property.”
Fujie ruled that, if anything, McBride’s complaint made it clear that she “has unclean hands that prevent her from profiting from her actions.”
Emily St. Martin
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