The Dallas Cowboys owner is going to trial to establish paternity and collect $1.6 million.
Texas’s TexarkANA (CN) — Jerry Jones, the billionaire owner of the Dallas Cowboys, was subjected to derogatory remarks and personal assaults on Monday during his civil trial against the woman claiming to be his daughter. Jones is requesting payment of $1.6 million for the legal expenditures he incurred in fending off Alexandra Davis’s allegations. During opening comments, the 27-year-old Davis’s counsel informed the jury that Jones, 81, had stated in a deposition that he didn’t give a damn if he was Davis’ father and was just concerned with “protecting his real family.”
Defense lawyer Jay Gray pointed at a stony-faced Jones and stated, “That’s a very Jones thing to do.” “This case is about broken promises,” said Gray, who works for the Dallas law firm Bergman Gray. “His wife’s unfulfilled promises are the main focus of the story. Alex Davis never made any promises; a two-year-old is incapable of making any promises. On Monday, the courtroom gallery was crowded with more than fifty members of the press, witnesses, and legal staff. Jones was represented by Charles Babcock of Jackson Walker, a Houston-based company.
He informed the jurors that after Jones turned eighteen in 2014, Davis had made multiple attempts to solicit money from her. “At last, Mr. Jones expressed, ‘Enough is enough, too much is too much,'” the lawyer claimed. In the 1990s, Jones had an affair in Little Rock, Arkansas, with Cynthia Davis-Spencer, Davis’ mother. Davis-Spencer worked at the airport, where the two allegedly first met. Despite his denials, Jones and Davis-Spencer signed a settlement and secrecy agreement in 1998, when Davis was just 2 years old. Over the ensuing decades, Jones spent millions of dollars for Davis’ benefit.
Davis & Davis—Following Spencer’s appearance on the reality television program “Big Rich Texas,” Davis has been employed as a congressional aide for Amarillo-based Republican U.S. Representative Ronny Jackson. When Davis became an adult, she started a court battle with Jones. In an attempt to avoid the settlement, she initially sued him in Dallas County in 2022. However, she withdrew the lawsuit before a decision was made.
Jones seeks reimbursement for the money he spent defending himself and alleges that the lawsuit revealing him as Davis’ father violated their agreement regarding privacy. Sandra Jackson, the district judge for Dallas County, mandated that Jones take a paternity test in February. There is a pending appeal.
In March 2023, Davis filed a defamation lawsuit against Jones in federal court in Texarkana, referencing Jones’s assertions that he was being “shaken down” and “extorted.” In December 2023, U.S. District Judge Robert Schroeder granted Davis another opportunity to show defamation against a more stringent standard because she met the requirements to be considered a restricted public figure. However, Schroeder dismissed Davis’s second case in March. According to evidence presented by the judge, Davis asked Jones for money four times between 2017 and 2021.
In May 2023, Jones filed a counterclaim for breach of contract, requesting a ruling that the parties remain bound by the terms of the settlement. Davis-Spencer agreed, according to Jones, to forego going to court to prove her paternity and to keep the deal quiet in exchange for a $375,000 lump sum payment and the creation of two trust accounts for Davis. According to the team owner, over her upbringing, Davis received 230 payments totaling almost $1.9 million, which included $70,000 for a new Range Rover and $33,000 for a “sweet 16” birthday celebration.
Jones claims that once Davis became eighteen, he paid 140 more payments totaling about $1.2 million, of which $270,000 was for Southern Methodist University’s four years of tuition and fees and $24,000 was for a vacation to Asia after graduation. According to Jones’ 15-page counterclaim, he has been paying Davis’ apartment rent since at least 2015 and has contributed a total of about $3.2 million. When Davis turned 21 in December 2017, according to Jones, the trust payments ceased. Davis had informed one of Jones’ attorneys at a Dallas steakhouse one month earlier that she wanted to be paid additional money, even though Jones wasn’t required to.
When Babcock informed jurors that Davis requested an extra $20 million and a contract of her own, saying Jones, “I don’t care what agreement was made with my mom,” there was an audible grumble from the gallery behind Jones’ legal team. Gray informed the jury When Davis was eight years old, she sketched “an alien coming down from outer space” to represent her family for school even though she was unaware that Jones was her father. He said that although she was forced to abide by the settlement’s conditions, professors had persuaded her to reveal his identify.
“Is it possible for a mother to instruct a daughter to keep her father a secret?” Gray enquired. He stated of Jones, “We can’t make him a good man or a good father.” “We don’t need to assist him in mistreating his daughter.” Earlier this month, Judge Schroeder declared the parties’ settlement to be legal. He said that the jury should determine whether Davis approved the settlement when she became eighteen years old.