Jeff Bezos is likely to beat the defamation suit brought by his girlfriend's brother. Here's how the Amazon CEO became embroiled in a tangled web of lawsuits and family drama.
Avery Hartmans
- A defamation lawsuit against Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is on the verge of being thrown out, the latest update in a months-long legal battle.
- Michael Sanchez — the brother of Bezos' girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez — claimed Bezos and his head of security, Gavin de Becker, falsely accused Sanchez of providing the nude photos of Bezos to the National Enquirer.
- The suit followed a scandal that erupted in January 2019, when the Enquirer revealed Bezos was in a relationship with Lauren Sanchez and published details of messages and photos they had exchanged.
- A subsequent investigation found evidence that Saudi Arabian officials had hacked Bezos' phone, while media reports found that Michael Sanchez had been a source for the Enquirer.
A defamation lawsuit against Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos is on the verge of being thrown out, the latest development in a months-long high-profile drama.
Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge John P. Doyle issued a tentative ruling on Thursday that granted Bezos' motion to throw out a suit filed by Michael Sanchez — the brother of Bezos' girlfriend, Lauren Sanchez — accusing him and his head of security, Gavin de Becker, of defamation.
"We respectfully disagree with the trial court's ruling and look forward to vindicating Mr. Sanchez's claims on appeal," Tom Warren, Sanchez's attorney, told Business Insider in an emailed statement.
William Isaacson, an attorney representing Bezos and de Becker, said in an emailed statement to Business Insider that "journalists will surely take the Court's ruling into account when considering Michael Sanchez as a source."
"My clients are pleased that the judge has thrown out the baseless case filed by Michael Sanchez," Isaacson said. "When it comes to frivolous lawsuits seeking money or attention, the law is clear — and the law worked."
The court's tentative ruling marks the beginning of the end of a legal battle between the Amazon billionaire and his girlfriend's brother that was sparked by a tabloid scoop nearly two years ago and subsequent investigations into Sanchez, the National Enquirer, and even the crown prince of Saudi Arabia.
Here's where the conflict began and everything that's happened since.
In January 2019, Bezos and his then wife, MacKenzie, announced they were divorcing.
Source: Jeff Bezos/Twitter
Their announcement was followed soon after by bombshell reporting from Page Six and the National Enquirer: Bezos was in a relationship with Lauren Sanchez, a helicopter pilot and former TV anchor.
Source: Page Six
At the time, Sanchez was married to Patrick Whitesell, the co-CEO of WME, a Hollywood talent agency. The couple had been friends with Jeff and MacKenzie Bezos because they had houses near each other in Seattle, according to Page Six.
Source: Page Six
The Enquirer said it had conducted a four-month investigation into the relationship between Bezos and Sanchez, tracking the couple "across five states and 40,000 miles" and tailing them on hikes and dinner dates.
Source: The National Enquirer
Beyond its own surveillance of Bezos and Sanchez, the Enquirer reported it had acquired "raunchy messages" the couple had sent each other, some of which the tabloid published. The Enquirer also said it had racy photos of both Bezos and Sanchez, including one that was too explicit to describe in print.
Source: The National Enquirer
Soon after, The Daily Beast reported that Bezos was funding an investigation — headed up by his personal head of security, Gavin de Becker — into who had leaked his private messages to the Enquirer. De Becker said at the time that he thought the leaks were "politically motivated," which AMI denied.
Source: The Daily Beast,
In February 2019, Bezos responded to the scandal in an explosive blog post, in which he accused National Enquirer publisher AMI and its then CEO, David Pecker, of trying to blackmail him.
Source: Jeff Bezos/Medium
Bezos wrote that AMI had been threatening him with the publication of explicit pictures he'd taken of himself unless he stopped investigating who leaked his photos and texts to the tabloid. In response, Bezos published the emails he'd received from AMI.
Source: Jeff Bezos/Medium
"Rather than capitulate to extortion and blackmail, I've decided to publish exactly what they sent me, despite the personal cost and embarrassment they threaten," Bezos wrote.
Source: Jeff Bezos/Medium
De Becker told The Daily Beast that Michael Sanchez was "among the people we've been speaking with and looking at" during the investigation and that "strong leads point to political motives" for leaking information to the Enquirer.
Source: The Daily Beast
Sanchez had described himself as a supporter of President Donald Trump, who had a longtime ally in Pecker. De Becker told the Washington Post in February 2019 that he thought the Enquirer had published its scoop about Bezos and Sanchez in order to embarrass Bezos, and that members of Trump's 2016 campaign were involved.
Source: The Washington Post
A feud has simmered for years between Trump and Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post. Trump has made the Post a target over the years and has lumped together Amazon and the Post as a way to cast doubt on the paper's credibility.
Source: The Washington Post
For his part, Sanchez denied de Becker's allegation, accusing him of telling "lies, half-truths, sloppy tabloid leaks, [and] crazy conspiracy theories" in a statement to the Washington Post. He told Fox News that "all of the investigations thus far have cleared me of any involvement in the below-the-belt selfies."
Source: The Washington Post, Business Insider
Sanchez told Business Insider that he did not leak Bezos' "penis photos" to the Enquirer, but did not specifically deny leaking text messages between his sister and Bezos. "I'm not saying I didn't do something," he later told Vanity Fair, but said his only goal was to protect his sister and Bezos' relationship.
Source: Business Insider, Vanity Fair
Sanchez had worked as a Hollywood talent manager, and he told Fox News that Bezos had asked him for help handling the scandal around his divorce. "He said that he didn't think the Amazon PR team was equipped to handle this kind of story," Sanchez said of Bezos.
Source: Business Insider
In March 2019, de Becker wrote in The Daily Beast that he believed the Saudi Arabian government had hacked Bezos' phone in order to gain access to his private messages in retaliation for the Post reporting Saudi agents killed Post columnist, Jamal Khashoggi.
Source: The Daily Beast
In January 2020, that assertion was backed up by reports by the Guardian and United Nations investigators, who said they had "reasonable certainty" that Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman was involved in a hack of Bezos' iPhone.
Source: Business Insider
Throughout it all, AMI has insisted that Michael Sanchez is the single source behind its reporting on Lauren Sanchez's relationship with Bezos. According to a New York Times report from January, Lauren Sanchez shared the texts and photos with her brother, who then licensed them to the Enquirer for $200,000 in October 2018.
Source: The New York Times
In February, Michael Sanchez filed a defamation lawsuit against Bezos that claims Bezos and de Becker falsely accused him of providing the nude photos to the Enquirer. Sanchez claimed in the suit that Bezos told journalists he had handed over the images to the tabloid, but Sanchez said he never had the photos in his possession.
Source: Business Insider
Following the lawsuit filing, Lauren Sanchez said in a statement to TMZ that her brother "secretly provided my most personal information to the National Enquirer — a deep and unforgivable betrayal. My family is hurting over this new baseless and untrue lawsuit, and we truly hope my brother finds peace."
Source: TMZ
In the lawsuit, Sanchez used the word "fiancé" to describe Bezos' relationship to Lauren Sanchez, implying that the couple is engaged.
Source: Business Insider
Bezos quickly filed a motion to dismiss the suit under a California law that's intended to protect against frivolous lawsuits. Bezos said Sanchez's suit amounted to "extortion" and directly threatened free speech.
Source: Business Insider
This week, Los Angeles County Superior Court tentatively ruled in favor of Bezos, striking down Sanchez's defamation suit. "Here, there is no admissible evidence that Defendants published the subject statements. Plaintiff's declaration merely discusses what he was told by reporters, which is inadmissible hearsay," Judge John P. Doyle wrote in his ruling.
The judge's ruling is tentative, however, which means the suit hasn't been dismissed. The next hearing in the case is scheduled for November 24.
Source: Superior Court of California, County of Los Angeles
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