Glenn Sanford, eXp named as defendants in sex assault case

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Lower than three weeks after a choose dismissed eXp and founder Glenn Sanford from a sexual assault lawsuit, the lady who filed the case has added the corporate and government again into the case as defendants as soon as once more.

Anya Roberts names eXp Realty, father or mother agency eXp World Holdings and Sanford as defendants in a brand new amended grievance filed on June 13. The submitting is notable as a result of, on the finish of Might, U.S. District Choose André Birotte had dismissed the brokerage, father or mother agency and government from the case. Amongst different issues, Birotte mentioned Roberts failed to ascertain an employer relationship between Sanford and different defendants and didn’t present how eXp benefited from ignoring claims of misbehavior.

The newly amended grievance seeks to extra strongly join Sanford and eXp to the alleged misbehavior of different defendants within the case.

Nonetheless, in a press release to Inman Tuesday, eXp argued that the claims towards it are baseless.

“EXp Realty has zero tolerance for abuse, harassment, or misconduct of any variety — together with by the unbiased actual property brokers who use our companies,” the assertion argues. “EXp hopes and trusts that the court docket will give a full and honest listening to to the plaintiffs as they proceed to pursue claims towards the people who allegedly assaulted them. Nonetheless, the claims towards eXp and its management haven’t any foundation actually or legislation.”

Information of the amended grievance was first reported by Housing Wire.

Roberts first filed the go well with in December. Amongst different issues, she has claimed that now-former eXp agent and recruiter David Golden and his girlfriend, Emily Keenan, drugged and sexually assaulted her throughout a boating journey in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, in 2020. Roberts, additionally an eXp agent, has moreover alleged in her court docket filings that Golden promised her she’d expertise “extra monetary success” if she made him her sponsor.

A month after the Puerto Vallarta incident, Roberts traveled to Daytona Seashore, Florida, based on her grievance, the place Golden allegedly gave her a “exercise performance-enhancing drug” of their shared lodge room. She handed out once more and allegedly woke the following morning to a different agent and recruiter, Michael Bjorkman, exposing himself to her.

Golden, Keenan and Bjorkman are all named as defendants within the case. The case additionally names present eXp agent Michael Sherrard as a defendant, saying he groped Roberts in 2021.

Moreover, the brand new amended grievance provides eXp agent and staff chief Brent Gove again into the case. Gove hosted the occasions at which the alleged assaults happened and was initially a defendant within the case, however a choose had dismissed him together with Sanford and the corporate in Might.

In dismissing Sanford and different defendants, the choose mentioned final month that Roberts didn’t show that Sanford and eXp had something to achieve “from plaintiff switching her sponsor in response to the alleged intercourse acts.” The choose additionally mentioned Roberts didn’t show that Sanford and eXp have been conscious of the police reviews she filed. In Gove’s case, the choose mentioned Roberts’ grievance wanted “extra info” to show Gove was conscious of staff members’ alleged actions.

Roberts’ new, amended grievance is supposed to handle these numerous points. As an illustration, it states that in October of 2020 eXp “acquired a memo with granular element describing the earlier blatant, overt, and well-known conduct of” Bjorkman and Golden, who routinely invited “brokers to recruiting events the place they might drug and assault people — beneath the guise of agent attraction.”

The amended grievance later states that in April 2022, an eXp board member spoke to the remainder of the board concerning the firm’s “failure to take any motion to curb the sexual assault incidents that have been occurring at eXp Realty.” The amended grievance claims the corporate ignored that board member’s instructed options, and that Sanford himself mentioned the allegations have been “not eXp’s downside.” The amended grievance goes on to state that Sanford mentioned the allegations, in addition to Bjorkman being arrested, “could be merely a three- to five-day newspaper phenomenon, which might then disappear.”

Such anecdotes apparently intention to point out that eXp and Sanford knew concerning the state of affairs however didn’t take applicable motion.

In the end, the amended grievance states that “the detestable actions” that prompted the go well with “have been rampant inside eXp tradition; they occurred throughout eXp occasions, at agent-sponsored occasions, in addition to at occasions the place eXp was in attendance; it permeated the corporate’s tradition.”

Roberts’ go well with isn’t the one one elevating problems with sexual assault at eXp; in one other case, former eXp recruits Fabiola Acevedo, Tami Sims, Christiana Lundy and one other girl often called Jane Doe 3, make related allegations towards Golden and Bjorkman. That go well with names Golden, Bjorkman, Gove, eXp World Holdings, eXp Realty and Sanford as defendants.

In Roberts’ case, she ranges a complete of eight totally different counts — together with sexual battery, intentional infliction of emotional misery and different expenses — towards the assorted defendants. She concludes her amended grievance by asking for a jury trial in addition to unspecified damages.

Learn the total amended grievance right here: 

E-mail Jim Dalrymple II