On Monday, a Texas appellate court ruled that a dismissed personal injury lawsuit against Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones from 2020 should proceed, reversing the prior decision.
The case had been dismissed in February but will now likely head to trial.
The lawsuit comes from a woman who says that Jones “kissed her on the mouth and forcibly grabbed her without her consent” on Sept. 16, 2018, at AT&T Stadium. It was later added to the lawsuit that the incident allegedly occurred in the Tom Landry Room.
Originally the lawsuit was against both Jones and the Dallas Cowboys Football Club, claiming that team officials “knew or should have known of Jones’s misconduct.” While the National Football League was later added as a defendant, they are no longer listed as part of the complaint.
In a court response, Jones denied the accusations and called them “malicious and hurtful.”
The woman who filed the lawsuit, who goes by J.G., says that the incident caused her to suffer “severe emotional distress,” “psychological pain and suffering” and medical expenses.
After the case was initially dismissed, that judge said the accuser failed to comply with a special exemptions order. However, the appellate court’s decision to reverse the dismissal says the woman “made a good faith attempt to amend her pleadings in response to the court’s special exceptions order” and so “the trial court abused its discretion in dismissing appellant’s claims.”
