Esports

Law Firm Representing Sharon O’Donnell Pushes Back on Riot Claims


Sottile Baltaxe, the law firm representing Sharon O’Donnell, the former employee who named Riot Games and its CEO Nicolo Laurent in a sexual misconduct and wrongful termination lawsuit filed in January, has issued a response to the company’s statement that she was a problematic employee.

In its statement responding to the lawsuit last week, Riot Games said that O’Donnell, who worked at the company as an executive assistant,  “was dismissed from the company over seven months ago following more than a dozen complaints from both employees and external partners and after multiple coaching discussions to try and address these concerns. Any suggestion otherwise is simply false.”

Attorney Michael Baltaxe of California-based law firm Sottile Baltaxe issued the following statement to The Esports Observer on Sunday in response to Riot’s framing of O’Donnell’s termination from the company and her behavior as an employee:

“Ms. ODonnell strongly denies that her wrongful termination had anything to do with complaints made by employees or external partners. She alleges that she was never made aware of any such complaints. Nor was there any ‘coaching.’ Instead, there were sexist comments made about her ‘tone.’ She alleges that she was wrongfully terminated because she refused to give in to Nicholas Laurent’s sexual overtures. She also alleges that she was also wrongfully terminated because she was a strong woman in a male dominated sexist company where women are devalued. She looks forward to proving her case.”

The 18-page lawsuit filed in January by O’Donnell in Los Angeles County Superior Court claims that Laurent created a “hostile work environment” by allegedly engaging in a variety of misconduct including making unwanted sexual advances, and demeaning comments about gender, among many other accusations listed in the complaint. O’Donnell claims that she was fired for rebuffing these advances in July 2020. O’Donnell worked with the League of Legends and Valorant developer from October 2017 to July 2020. Riot has denied all of these accusations.




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