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Daily Mail reporter Josh Bowell recently sat down for an exclusive interview on Zack Peter's No Filter podcast, exploring Blake Lively's alleged "phantom subpoena". In an episode uploaded to Peter's YouTube channel on April 22, 2025, the podcaster asked Bowell why the phantom subpoena was "so mysterious".
Zack asked why the subpoena was not seen publicly, even after several notable publications had reported on it.
"We obtained a copy of this subpoena just to view from a source. I can't go into more details about that because I need to protect that source. It's anybody who comes to us anonymously or wanting that protection, thats something that is very important to us," the Daily Mail reporter responded.
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According to reports from last week, Blake Lively is claimed to have "secretly sued" Justin Baldoni months before she filed her official complaint in December 2024.
The secret lawsuit supposedly allowed her legal team to subpoena Justin's former publicist and public relations manager, Stephanie Jones, to secure confidential texts and conversations between Baldoni and others. These texts allegedly implicated the director in planning a smear campaign against Lively.
Josh Bowell explained how information gained from the alleged subpoena led to the Daily Mail conducting an official investigation. The reporter added that other publications conducted investigations because they, too, were approached by anonymous sources.
"I think other people have got hold of this subpoena or been able to view it with the same kind of restrictions. It seems to me that other media as well has a source that has let them see this subpoena but it's like 'I won't give this to you to publish.' It's probably something to do with the legal restrictions around it," he said.
The reporter then drew attention back to the ongoing legal feud between Blake and Justin Baldoni, claiming that Lively's legal team did not intend for there to be so much coverage over the "phantom subpoena".
"It might be the person providing the subpoena didn't want this story to come out. They didn't want this whole thing about Vanzan to come out. They just wanted a story saying 'oh look, there is a subpoena'. They didn't want someone digging into it, which is what we ended up doing," Josh Bowell claimed.
Everything we know about Blake Lively's alleged "phantom subpoena"
On April 18, Daily Mail's Justin Bowell uploaded a feature on Blake Lively, suggesting the actor had quietly filed a "clandestine lawsuit" months before officially filing a misconduct complaint against her It Ends With Us co-star.
The alleged lawsuit is claimed to have allowed Lively's attorneys to subpoena Justin Baldoni's former publicist, Stephanie Jones, in a supposed plot to obtain "damning text messages".
The report suggests that after obtaining all the information from Stephanie Jones and her firm, Jonesworks, the lawsuit was dropped. Alleged court papers suggest the "shadow lawsuit" was reportedly filed in Manhattan Supreme Court on September 27, 2024, by a company called Vanzan.
The lawsuit supposedly accused 10 unidentified individuals of harming Vanzan's business. The reported filing, however, does not specify what these individuals did wrong or name anyone involved in the Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively legal feud, which Bowell claims allowed the case to "slip unnoticed into the legal system".
The New York attorney who filed the secret lawsuit, Samantha Katze, reportedly issued a subpoena to Stephanie Jones and Jonesworks on October 1, 2024. Katze allegedly demanded all documents and communications that related to Blake Lively, her husband Ryan Reynolds, and Justin Baldoni.
Stephanie seemingly did not contest the request and reportedly provided all requested communications to Katze, turning over alleged messages between ex-employee Jennifer Abel, crisis management guru Melissa Nathan, and Justin Baldoni.
The text messages are alleged to have been communications that purportedly implicate Baldoni, Abel, and Nathan in coordinating a smear campaign against Lively during Its End With Us' promotion cycle.
In what is being referred to as "an infamous text" from Nathan, the crisis management guru supposedly claims:
"We can bury anyone"
On December 19, 2024, Katze reportedly withdrew the alleged Vanzan filing without any further action. A day later, however, Blake Lively formally filed a misconduct complaint against Justin Baldoni, accusing the director of s*xual harassment and retaliation.
According to records, Vanzan is a Delaware-based firm that was founded in 2010, with Daily Mail's Josh Bowell claiming the company's operations in California led to the supposed discovery of Lively being the firm's CEO, secretary, and CFO.
Blake Lively's attorney, Esra Hudson, claimed that "doe lawsuits" like Vanzan's filing are entirely appropriate legal tools used to pursue claims and uncover the identities of unknown perpetrators.
"This lawsuit unearthed the Wayfarer parties' documented plan – in their own words, in their own text messages—to 'destroy' Blake Lively. Their faux outrage has nothing to do with legal ethics or the law, which are not an issue here, and is entirely about the fact that they got caught doing something that they insisted would be 'untraceable,'" Hudsan stated.
Justin Baldoni's attorney, Bryan Freedman, claimed to have been unaware of the filing's existence until Daily Mail reached out for a comment, stating:
"This appears to be an end-around, skirting the process, to be able to secretly get these documents without having to give anyone notice. That would be an abuse of process and we intend to take all action allowable under the law.'
This week, the Attorney spoke with Deadline Magazine about the "phantom subpoena," explaining:
"Ms. Lively’s and Mr. Reynolds’ company Vanzan had nothing to do with this case and they knew it. This sham lawsuit was designed to obtain subpoena power without oversight or scrutiny, and in doing so denied my clients the ability to contest the propriety, nature, and scope of the subpoena."
The inclusion of alleged subpoenaed text messages mentioned in Lively's December filing initially raised eyebrows, with Bryan Freedman also suggesting that none of his clients had been subpoenaed.
The attorney also claimed that a subpoena can't be issued without an associated case number from a formally filed legal complaint, which at the time no longer existed.
Both Justin Baldoni and Blake Lively have denied each other's accusations and dismissed the allegations. The It Ends With Us co-stars are set to go to trial on March 9, 2025.
