Nevada woman lost her bid to have Cristiano Ronaldo, international soccer player, forced to pay million dollars more for her hush money of $375,000 after she claimed he had raped and raped him in Las Vegas.

U.S. District Judge Jennifer Dorsey, Las Vegas, kicked out the case for the woman’s lawyer, Leslie Mark Stovall. Stovall was accused of “bad-faith behavior” and using stolen and leaked documents that detail attorney-client conversations between Ronaldo (his lawyers) and Stovall. Dorsey stated that the case was beyond redemption because of this.

Dorsey, in her 42-page decision stated that dismissing a case without an option to file it again was a serious sanction. But she claimed Ronaldo had been hurt by Stovall’s conduct.

“I believe that the procurement of and continued use these documents were bad faith and disqualifying Stovall does not remedy the prejudice to Ronaldo, because the misappropriated papers and their confidential contents had been woven into (plaintiff Kathryn Mayorga)’s claims,” said the ruling. “Harsh penalties are justifiable.”

Stovall did no immediate respond to Saturday’s email or telephone calls. Larissa Drohobyczer was not contacted by text message. The decision could be appealed to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. Circuit Court of Appeals, San Francisco

Peter Christiansen was Ronaldo’s Las Vegas lawyer and was away at the time. He was unable to be reached for comment immediately.

The Associated Press doesn’t usually identify victims of sexual abuse, but Mayorga agreed through Stovall & Drohobyczer for her name to be made public.

Dorsey signaled that she was willing to close the case earlier in this year after Stovall missed a deadline for his claim for over $25 million in damages. The claims were that Ronaldo, or one of his associates, had breached a confidentiality contract in 2010. Reports about this agreement were published in European publications in 2017.

Mayorga’s civil lawsuit — filed in 2018 in state court and moved in 2019 to federal court — alleged that Ronaldo or his associates violated the confidentiality agreement before the German news outlet Der Spiegel published an article titled “Cristiano Ronaldo’s Secret” based on documents obtained from “whistleblower portal Football Leaks.”

Ronaldo’s legal staff blamed reports about electronic data leaks from documents stolen from European law firms. Christiansen also claimed that the information had been altered or fabricated.

Since 2018, Christiansen and Kendelee Works, an attorney in Las Vegas, have successfully fought to keep the disclosure pact secret.

Mayorga was a teacher and former model. She lives in Las Vegas. According to her lawsuit, she met Ronaldo in a nightclub. She then went along with other guests to Ronaldo’s hotel suite. There she claimed that he attacked her in a bedroom. At the time, she was 25 years old. He was 24.

Ronaldo’s legal teams do not dispute Ronaldo’s meeting Mayorga. They had sex June 2009 but they claimed it was consensual, not rape.

Mayorga reported to Las Vegas police, at which point the investigation was dropped. Mayorga had not identified the attacker she claimed or stated where the incident happened, according to police and prosecutors.

Ronaldo (now 37) is one the most high-paid and well-known athletes in the world. Ronaldo plays for Manchester United in the English Premier League and was the captain of the Portuguese national soccer team. He was a Turin-based player for Juventus in Italy during the last several years.

After Mayorga filed a lawsuit, Las Vegas police opened their rape probe again. However Clark County District Attorney Steve Wolfson decided not to press criminal charges in 2019.

Wolfson, Las Vegas’ elected public prosecutor, stated that too many years had passed without any evidence proving Mayorga was innocent.

Stovall maintained Mayorga had not broken the hush-money agreement. Her lawsuit sought to void it, accusing Ronaldo and reputation-protection “fixers” of conspiracy, defamation, breach of contract, coercion and fraud. Stovall calculated damages to the tune of $25 million, plus legal fees in documents she filed last year.

Mayorga, according to her attorney, had learning disabilities when she was a child. Ronaldo’s representatives pressured Mayorga so much that she refused to accept the $375,000 payment in August 2010 and drop her criminal charge.

U.S. Magistrate Daniel Albregts made the recommendations that Dorsey follow. He handled the preliminary and procedural rulings.

Albregts stated in an October 2021 report that “there is no way this case can proceed if the court cannot tell which arguments and testimony were based upon these privileged documents.”

Albregts said that Stovall was guilty of “acting in bad faith”, asking for, receiving, using and using Football Leaks documents against Mayorga. Stovall was blamed for his “audacious”, “impertinent”, and “abusive” attempts to make public the confidential agreement through legal maneuvers. He recommended that Dorsey reject Stovall’s assertion that Mayorga did not have the mental capacity to sign it in 2010.

In the beginning of this year, The 9th Circuit declared that Dorsey was responsible for deciding that question.

Dorsey did not make it clear whether anyone could still see the Las Vegas Police report about Ronaldo that was compiled after Mayorga’s 2018 lawsuit.

Albregts stated in March that depriving the New York Times of access to the police data “would almost certainly raise concerns about government censorship.” He recommended Dorsey move the newspaper’s open records request to documents to a State Court.

Albregts determined that a protective order Dorsey issued to block the release of the 2010 agreement didn’t apply the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department and does not prohibit LVMPD “from disseminating their criminal investigation file.”

Lawyer Margaret McLetchie representing the newspaper did not reply to my Saturday message.