Chicago Bears legend Richard Dent has won another chance to resume his pursuit of so-far anonymous people who he claims wrongly accused him of groping a woman, and of drunken behavior, prompting an investigation that cost him and his company a marketing contract with an energy supplier.
On Nov. 25, a three-justice panel of the Illinois First District Appellate Court ruled a Cook County judge had wrongly blocked Dent from continuing his effort to unmask the identities of those he said had fouled his reputation and interfered with his business.
The case dates back to March 2019, when Dent and his company, RLD Resources, filed a petition in Cook County Circuit Court, asking a judge to order energy supplier Constellation NewEnergy to disclose the names and addresses of at least three people who Dent claimed had defamed him.
According to its website, RLD Resources has for more than 18 years helped energy companies market natural gas products.
Dent founded the company after his professional football career ended. Dent played as a defensive end in the National Football League from 1983-1997, including 12 seasons with the Chicago Bears. He was the Most Valuable Player in the Bears’ Super Bowl XX victory, and was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2011.
According to court documents, Dent claimed Constellation pulled the plug on contracts with him and RLD Resources after an investigation was triggered by accusations leveled by at least two individuals concerning alleged misconduct by Dent.
According to court documents, an anonymous woman accused Dent of alleged misconduct on at least two occasions. The first allegedly occurred at a Constellation-sponsored golf outing near Philadelphia in June 2016, when Dent allegedly told the woman she “had a butt like a sister.”
That same woman – identified in court documents as “Person A” - also allegedly accused Dent of groping her two years later at a party at Chicago’s Shedd Aquarium, before another Constellation-sponsored golf outing.
Another person, a male identified as “Person B,” allegedly told Constellation that, at the same Constellation-sponsored event, “he had observed Dent” at the Marriott Hotel on Adams Street in Chicago “collecting the golf materials and that Dent was drunk and disorderly.”
According to court documents, those accusations allegedly triggered an investigation by another individual, identified as “Person C,” that resulted in Constellation sacking their contracts with Dent and RLD in October 2018.
According to court documents, Dent has denied those accusations, saying they are completely false.
A few months after the contracts were terminated, Dent filed his petition, indicating his desire to sue those three unidentified individuals, as well as potentially others who may have been involved.
However, Constellation fought the petition. They said that information should be considered “qualifiedly privileged as a matter of law as statements made to an employer by a victim of sexual harassment concerning inappropriate touching experienced while at work,” among other factors.
The company did reveal that Person B is a Constellation employee, who made his statements in the course of investigating the accusations leveled by Person A. Further, the company said “Person C” are actually a group of attorneys who Constellation hired to investigate Person A’s accusations.
In June 2019, Cook County Judge Patricia O’Brien-Sheahan sided with Constellation, finding it was enough for Dent to know “the identities of the Constellation respondents and their attorneys,” because Dent could merely sue the company.
That decision prompted Dent to appeal.
The appellate justices said Judge O’Brien-Sheahan moved too soon to dismiss Dent’s petition.
The justices agreed with Dent’s contention that this was not merely a “fishing expedition,” but that he knew enough to be allowed to attempt to sue these people who he claims cost him his contracts.
Knowing how to find Constellation and its attorneys is not enough to satisfy court rules governing evidence discovery, the justices said.
“… We find that the trial court abused its discretion when it … dismissed the petition with prejudice based on the trial court’s determination that presuit discovery of the identity of Persons A, B, and C was not necessary because petitions knew the identity of Constellation and its attorneys,” the justices wrote.
“… Constellation and its attorneys were not the entity or people who made the alleged false and defamatory statements about Dent’s conduct at the events sponsored by Constellation,” the justices wrote. “They were merely participants in the subsequent investigation of the alleged defamatory statements that resulted in the termination of (Dent’s) at-will contracts.”
The appellate justices sent the case back to Cook County court for further proceedings on Dent’s petition.
Justice Bertina Lampkin authored the First District court opinion. Justices Robert E. Gordon and Jesse G. Reyes concurred.
Dent has been represented in the case by attorney Paul G. Neilan, of Highland Park.
Constellation has been represented by attorneys Terri L. Mascherin and Christian L. Plummer, of the firm of Jenner & Block LLP, of Chicago.