The woman who unsuccessfully sought a restraining order against Dodgers pitcher Trevor Bauer has asked a court to assess $10,000 in penalties against him and his attorneys for taking legal action that his attorney says “suggests Mr. Bauer is effectively looking for a way to continue harassing and molesting” the woman.
On February 7, one day before the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said it would not pursue criminal charges against Bauer for sexual assault, Bauer’s attorneys served the Pasadena Police Department with a subpoena requesting all cell phone records. of the woman. In a court filing this week, the woman’s attorneys asked a Los Angeles County Superior Court judge to dismiss the summons.
The hearing is scheduled for April 4.
That date is four days after the start of the major league season, as long as owners and players reach a new collective bargaining agreement in time to preserve the current schedule. Representatives for Bauer and the league declined to comment Saturday on how the timing of the hearing could affect MLB’s disciplinary process.
The league has the right to suspend a player for violating its sexual assault policy, even if the player is not charged with a crime. Bauer has yet to meet with MLB investigators, and information from the phone records could, in theory, help him argue that he did nothing wrong and that he should not be suspended.
In a letter included in the latest filing, the Pasadena city attorney’s office asked Bauer’s attorneys to withdraw the subpoena, arguing in part that the publicity surrounding Bauer’s case could mean that “future victims of abuse sexual abuse may be deterred from reporting the abuse” if the subject of an investigation and the public can access personal records “even outside of a civil or criminal trial.”
In response, Bauer’s attorney, Shawn Holley, wrote: “There is no public interest in protecting those who make materially misleading claims from the disclosure of information that exonerates the alleged perpetrator.” In her ruling, the judge who rejected the restraining order said the woman had made “misleading” statements.
A previous court filing by Bauer claimed that he intended to use the phone records to ask that the woman be ordered to pay her attorneys’ fees, arguing that the woman improperly used the restraining order process to “gain publicity.” and damage the race [de Bauer]” and “deliberately and systematically deleted and concealed much information … including communications with his closest friends that revealed his improper motive.”
Bauer’s legal team filed a court application indicating its intent to claim attorneys’ fees, but has not yet filed a motion formally requesting fees.
Lisa Helfend Meyer, the woman’s attorney, argued that the penalties would reflect what she called “misuse of the cover-up process” in a restraining order case that ended six months ago. She argued that Bauer has not filed a motion for attorneys’ fees and whatever the phone records may show is “not relevant to any analysis of whether he would be entitled to any award through a motion that does not exist.”
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