Shapiro v. Jacobson

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TREVOR SHAPIRO, et al., Plaintiffs, v. TRUDY JACOBSON, et al., Defendants.

No. 23 Civ. 3964 (LGS)

United States District Court, S.D. New York

August 5, 2024

OPINION & ORDER

LORNA G. SCHOFIELD, UNITED STATES DISTRICT JUDGE:

Plaintiffs Trevor Shapiro and Johanna Qvist bring this action against Defendants Trudy Jacobson and Stephen Komorek alleging violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (“RICO”), 18 U.S.C. § 1961, et seq., and New York state tort law. Defendants move to dismiss all claims in the First Amended Complaint (“FAC”). For the following reasons, the motion is granted, except for the claims for tortious interference with business relations.

I. BACKGROUND

The following facts are taken from the FAC. See Bellin v Zucker, 6 F.4th 463, 473 (2d Cir. 2021). These facts are assumed to be true for purposes of this motion and are construed in the light most favorable to Plaintiffs as the non-moving party. See Int'l Code Council, Inc. v UpCodes Inc., 43 F.4th 46, 53 (2d Cir. 2022).

Plaintiff Trevor Shapiro is a model and businessman. From approximately 2018 to December 2020, Shapiro and Defendant Trudy Jacobson engaged in a romantic relationship. The FAC alleges that after the relationship ended, Jacobson entered into “a campaign to harass, damage and defame” Shapiro.

The FAC alleges that as part of that campaign, Jacobson paid $1.8 million to an investigative agency called Conflict International to conduct certain private investigations of Shapiro and his friends. At the time, Defendant Stephen Komorek was the senior vice president of Conflict International.

In March 2021, Komorek hired a private investigator, who went to Shapiro's apartment and gave Shapiro a folder containing Shapiro's personal information and photographs of a man -misidentified as Shapiro -- with women. The investigator stated, “This is for you from the people in Italy,” allegedly referencing the Italian Mafia. “Literally moments” after the private investigator left, Shapiro received a text from Jacobson stating that a man gave her a folder at her apartment too.

Approximately two weeks later, when Shapiro was having dinner with friends, Shapiro received a text from Jacobson intended for an investigator, which stated, “[Shapiro's] guy friend the one I sent photos of, is at a restaurant.” Two unidentified men later visited Shapiro's female friend, handed her a folder of photos of her and Shapiro and stated, “[T]his is from the people in Italy.” In May 2021, two unidentified men took photos of Shapiro at a bowling alley with friends. When Shapiro approached the men, they denied taking photos of him and “quickly left.”

In June 2021, Shapiro and a friend, Cheyenne Lutek, created an online business called “Him-Eros,” “for women to hire men as escorts and companions at social and charity events.” An unidentified woman repeatedly asked on the website and over the phone if “any other guys [were] working on the site as a companion.” Lutek determined that the woman was Jacobson. When Lutek asked the caller if she was Jacobson, the caller “abruptly hung up.”

In June and July 2021, Shapiro learned that several online articles falsely portrayed him as a “male prostitute.” At least one article -- published on June 19, 2021, on a website called Law Enforcement Today (“LET”) -- accused Him-Eros of being a “cover for a male prostitution operation or something at least incredibly similar.” “Shortly after the publication of this article in LET,” Jacobson “bragged in text messages” to a third party that she paid for the June 19, 2021, article and other defamatory articles. The FAC alleges that these articles were designed to defame Shapiro and cause Him-Eros to shut down. Him-Eros shut down following the publication of the June 19, 2021, article “due to the bad publicity.” In addition, shortly after Shapiro signed with a modeling agency in May 2021, the agency declined to book him for photoshoots due to the false articles, including one that specifically referenced his relationship with the agency.

On July 27, 2021, Defendants and/or their agents generated, and Jacobson paid for, an article accusing Shapiro of becoming violent while drunk and on drugs at a modeling photoshoot. The article also accused Shapiro of stealing a watch and Chanel sunglasses -- the same items that Jacobson had given Shapiro on his birthday the prior year. However, Shapiro had not been hired for the photoshoot, the studio at which the alleged conduct occurred did not exist and the photographer's name was a pseudonym for Jacobson and/or her agents. Other defamatory articles appeared online targeting Lutek and Plaintiff Johanna Qvist, who is Shapiro's girlfriend.

In July 2021, an unidentified man followed Shapiro and Qvist from Brooklyn to Manhattan. The same man followed Shapiro on two other occasions in 2021. On the second occasion, Shapiro approached the man and mentioned Jacobson, and the man “immediately broke off the conversation and” left. In August 2021, an unidentified man repeatedly videotaped Shapiro in public.

“[I]nnumerable ‘troll' Instagram accounts” appeared humiliating and harassing Plaintiffs, including one account containing a photo of a rat that also appeared on Jacobson's personal Instagram page. Another Instagram account linked to an LET article about Lutek, paid for by Jacobson. Lutek's and Shapiro's family members also received packages containing “derogatory and defamatory materials.”

On November 17, 2021, six-foot tall banners appeared outside Qvist's apartment containing photos of Shapiro and Lutek, the statement “REPORT HUMAN TRAFFICKING” and a phone number for a human trafficking hotline. In December 2021, the same posters appeared throughout Qvist's neighborhood. After Qvist took down the posters, new ones were posted the following day. In January 2022, the same posters appeared outside Shapiro's apartment.

On October 29, 2021, LET published an article referencing Shapiro's alleged conduct at the photoshoot, calling Lutek “basically the equivalent of a porn actress,” calling Shapiro “the equivalent of a gigolo” and stating that both were “under investigation for sex trafficking and drugs.” On March 11, 2022, Defendants caused an article to be published online accusing Qvist of being a “pornstar” with a fake nursing career. On May 2, 2022, Jacobson paid for, and “Defendants caused,” an article to be published on LET repeating allegations of Shapiro's photoshoot conduct and falsely stating that Him-Eros was a “prostitution site” and that surveillance footage existed of Shapiro with women at hotels. On June 10, 2022, LET republished the June 19, 2021, and October 29, 2021, articles.

The FAC alleges that Shapiro's career was damaged after fashion designers and others saw the articles or received false information about Shapiro from Defendants. In February 2020, Jacobson contacted the owners of a business at which Shapiro worked to tell them that Shapiro was working at an “underground sex club.” Shapiro was terminated because of Jacobson's communication. On May 13, 2022, Jacobson told a fashion designer that Shapiro was having an illicit affair with an individual who ran a modeling agency and that Shapiro and the individual were harassing Jacobson. On July 29, 2022, the designer received a text from an unknown phone number -- alleged to be Jacobson or an associate she directed -- linking to a defamatory article about Shapiro. The designer told Shapiro, “[I]t is embarrassing bc I am trying to get you a campaign and people are seeing this . . . but my clients can see this [article].” The designer then “stopp[ed] working with Shapiro altogether.” Shapiro suffered “such severe psychological and emotional distress as a result of Defendants' actions that he required the assistance of a psychotherapist.”

On September 6, 2022, Jacobson contacted Qvist's workplace and stated that there were “naked pictures of your employee online”; human resources contacted Qvist as part of an investigation into the matter. Qvist also lost a work opportunity with Mount Sinai hospital because Jacobson contacted the hospital on September 6, 2022, and provided false information about Qvist. On November 18, 2022, Jacobson, or someone hired by her, impersonated Qvist and called Qvist's bank asking for information about her bank accounts; the woman had Qvist's passcode, social security number and other confidential information needed to access the account information. Qvist suffered severe emotional and psychological trauma from Defendants' actions.

The allegations in the FAC primarily took place between March 2021 and November 2022, except for the allegation that Jacobson contacted the owners of a business at which Shapiro worked to tell them that Shapiro was working at an “underground sex club,” which took place in February 2020 and predated Shapiro and Jacobson's break-up in December 2020. The FAC does not allege any activities between November 2022 and the filing of the FAC on December 17, 2023.

II. STANDARD

On a motion to dismiss, a court accepts as true all well-pleaded factual allegations and draws all reasonable inferences in favor of the non-moving party but does not consider conclusory allegations or legal conclusions couched as factual allegations. See Herrera v. Comme des Garcons Ltd., 84 F.4th 110, 113 (2d Cir. 2023). To withstand a motion to dismiss, “a complaint must contain sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face.” Kaplan v. Lebanese Canadian Bank, SAL, 999 F.3d 842, 854 (2d Cir. 2021) (quoting Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009)).^[1] “Threadbare recitals of the elements of a cause of action, supported by mere conclusory statements, do not suffice.” Iqb...