The WWE Board of Directors is investigating WWE Chairman and CEO Vince McMahon for a “hidden $3 million payment” he negotiated with a former employee after the two allegedly had an affair. John Laurinaitis, the head of WWE Talent Relations, is also being investigated.
According to people familiar with the Board’s investigation, a January 2022 separation agreement prohibits the now-former employee from disclosing her contact with McMahon or disparaging him, The Wall Street Journal reports. In 2019, the woman was hired as a paralegal.
The Board was purportedly made aware of the $3 million deal through a series of anonymous e-mails from someone claiming to be a friend of the former WWE paralegal.
The first e-mail, which was forwarded to Board members on March 30, claimed that McMahon recruited the woman for $100,000 and then upped her salary to $200,000 after they began a sexual relationship. The e-mail also alleges that McMahon “gave her like a toy” to Laurinaitis. The Board is looking into the claims made in the e-mail.
“My friend was so scared so she quit after Vince McMahon and lawyer Jerry paid her millions of dollars to shut up,” the initial e-mail to the Board said, referring to McMahon’s longtime attorney Jerry McDevitt.
On June 12, one of McMahon’s lawyers gave the directors a copy of the $3 million deal, according to a source familiar with the investigation. According to people familiar with the agreement, the former employee received a one-time payment of $1 million, with the remaining $2 million distributed over a five-year period.
According to those who spoke with her while she worked at WWE, the former employee, age 41, had fallen on hard times before joining WWE and expressed a desire for extra cash. She claimed to have a legal degree but had never taken the bar test, explaining to coworkers that her career had been put on hold while she cared for a sick parent.
The former employee moved from the legal department to become an assistant to Laurinaitis in 2021, according to people familiar with the investigation.
The Board’s inquiry began in April and has apparently found other, older nondisclosure agreements concerning claims by former female WWE employees of misconduct by McMahon and Laurinaitis, according to those close to the case. The Journal was unable to confirm how many earlier agreements are under review.
According to people familiar with the case, the Board’s outside counsel is still gathering information regarding the additional NDAs this week, but they have discovered that the payments totaled in the millions of dollars.
The investigation will be conducted by Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP, a law firm based in New York, which has been contracted by the Board’s eight independent directors. Vince used personal cash to compensate former female employees who signed the agreements, including one containing charges against Laurinaitis, according to the Board’s early findings. WWE’s compliance and Human Resources programs, as well as the company’s culture, are also being evaluated by the legal firm.
Lawyers for the independent directors asked WWE, McMahon, and Laurinaitis to turn over any complaints or allegations about any connections the executives may have had with company employees soon after the investigation began. Other nondisclosure agreements regarding claims against McMahon and Laurinaitis were recently discovered by the investigators.
According to a WWE representative, the company is fully participating with the Board’s investigation and that the relationship with the former paralegal was mutually beneficial. WWE takes the complaints seriously and is dealing with them correctly, according to the spokesman.
McMahon and Laurinaitis did not reply directly to requests for comment.
In a letter to The Journal, McDevitt stated that the former paralegal had not filed any harassment charges against McMahon and that “WWE did not pay any monies” to the former employee “on her departure.”
Stay tuned to PWMania.com for more.
