Justin Baldoni's lawyer claims that Blake Lively's team engaged in their own smear campaign and that the Vanzan lawsuit is a "sham"

Justin Baldoni's attorney, Bryan Freedman, recently claimed that Blake Lively's lawsuit under her company, Vanzan, was a scam. He accused her and her team of "intentionally circumventing the normal procedures for clearly improper purposes," as per Deadline.

Freedman continued that Lively and her team were allegedly caught "engaging in their own smear campaign" and rebuked any allegations of his client starting a smear campaign against Lively.

For context, the Daily Mail recently reported that Blake Lively had filed a "super shady" lawsuit through her company Vanzan in September 2024. This was months before she brought forth her complaint about Justin Baldoni's alleged s*xual harassment on the set of It Ends With Us, which was made public in December 2024.

According to Page Six, the Vanzan lawsuit, which listed the company as the plaintiff, attempted to send subpoenas to 10 unnamed Does, including Baldoni's former publicist Stephanie Jones and her company, Jonesworks. The subpoena asked Jones to turn over "all documents and communications" concerning Lively, Baldoni, and Lively's husband, Ryan Reynolds, as per the outlet.

In a statement to Deadline on April 24, Freedman dubbed the Vanzan lawsuit as "Van-sham," adding:

“We are not surprised at all that Ms. Jones would instruct her legal team to go on record and mischaracterize the circumstances surrounding the sham ‘subpoena’ and Vanzan lawsuit, so impressively uncovered by the passionate group of online sleuths."

Freedman continued:

"A cursory reading of the ‘Van-sham” lawsuit makes clear that the Lively Parties have been caught engaging in their own smear campaign, intentionally circumventing the normal procedures for clearly improper purposes by creating a farcical complaint with an unrelated plaintiff and no named defendants, ensuring that no one would know about or object to their attempt to obtain information they were not entitled to."

He added that there was never any smear campaign other than the one "being waged by the Lively Parties and Ms. Jones in collaboration with the New York Times." For context, The New York Times was the first publication to break the story of Blake Lively's complaint against Baldoni.

Along with s*xual harassment, Blake Lively also accused Baldoni and his PR team of orchestrating a smear campaign against her during the press for It Ends With Us to destroy her reputation.

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Exploring Blake Lively's Vanzan lawsuit

On April 18, the Daily Mail broke the news that Blake Lively had filed a lawsuit under her company, Vanzan, to subpoena several unnamed people last September. One of the subpoenas was reportedly sent to Baldoni's ex-publicist, Stephanie Jones, requesting that she and her company hand over all documents regarding both parties.

Jones reportedly received the subpoena on October 1, 2024, which "concerns, refers, relates and applies to any and all electronic records, data, documents, and communications in Your possession, custody or control collected from a cellular telephone containing the requested information" from December 1, 2022.

According to Page Six, Jones reportedly provided Lively and her team with the requested information. This included alleged messages between Baldoni, publicist Jennifer Abel (a former Joneswork employee), and PR crisis manager Melissa Nathan.

Notably, Lively's legal team used the alleged messages in an attempt to prove the existence of a smear campaign against her. One of the alleged messages from Nathan read, "We can bury anyone," referring to Blake Lively.

The Vanzan lawsuit was dropped before Lively's complaint on December 20, 2024. The actress's lawyers defended the Vanzan lawsuit in a statement to Deadline, adding that they had "absolutely nothing to hide."

“The Lively parties acted upon reliable information, and employed common tools such as Doe lawsuits and civil subpoenas that are entirely lawful and appropriate for pursuing claims and uncovering the identity of unknown perpetrators of unlawful activities,” Esra Hudson and Mike Gottlieb, Lively's lawyers, said.

They continued:

“This lawsuit unearthed the Wayfarer Parties' documented plan — in their own words, in their own text messages — to 'destroy' Blake Lively, a plan which they executed without transparency, disclosure, or notice to Ms. Lively or the public, instead acting in a way they thought would be 'untraceable.'"

However, Bryan Freedman claimed the lawsuit was in "bad faith" and "constitutes a flagrant abuse of process." In a statement to Deadline on April 21, he added that Vanzan's "sham lawsuit "was "designed to obtain subpoena power without oversight or scrutiny."

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The trial is set for March 2026, despite Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively requesting to be dismissed from Justin Baldoni's $400 million lawsuit filed in January.