Court issues January date to hear jeweler's lawsuit vs. Bryant

Cowboys wide receiver Dez Bryant received a Jan. 9, 2012 court date, according to The Dallas Morning News, in a civil lawsuit that he claimed in June was "done."

Eleow Hunt, a jeweler and ticket broker in Colleyville, Texas, filed suit in Tarrant County in September 2010, alleging Bryant and his confidante, David Wells, didn't pay him for about $600,000 in jewelry, sports tickets and loans given to the receiver before the Cowboys selected him in the first round of last year's NFL draft.

It was the second civil suit filed against Bryant within the past year. He settled with a New York jeweler in April over a $267,000 debt.

In addition to the lawsuits, Bryant had a well-publicized run-in with a Dallas-area mall's security staff this offseason. Those problems overshadowed what Bryant did on the field last season, when he had 45 receptions for 561 yards and six touchdowns as a rookie.

Bryant acknowledged in a recent interview that he's had to change the way he does some things.

"Of course there were problems (in the past), and there was some stuff I didn't understand that could have been a problem that I understand now," Bryant said earlier this month on KESN-FM. "I feel like I'm mature as a man and I've got my priorities straight."

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Response to NFL in Super Bowl lawsuit: We want lost income

DALLAS -- Super Bowl ticket-holders displaced during the seating fiasco at Cowboys Stadium in February said Tuesday in a court filing they should be compensated for lost income on top of the other expenses they incurred.

Ticket holders who lost their seats or had obstructed views "at a very minimum" should be paid for lost income suffered as a result of traveling to suburban Arlington, according to a document filed in response to a motion by the Dallas Cowboys and the NFL seeking to dismiss the class action lawsuit.

The lawsuit was filed after 1,250 temporary seats were declared unsafe just hours before the game between the Green Bay Packers and the Pittsburgh Steelers. It says 475 ticket holders were forced to watch from standing-room locations while others were relocated, causing them to miss part of the game won by Green Bay.

Another group of fans suffered because they learned upon arrival at the stadium that they had seats with obstructed views, the suit contends.

The NFL said last month in its motion to have the suit dismissed that it satisfied its obligations to the displaced fans by offering them the actual prices they paid for their tickets as well as all documented travel, lodging and meal expenses.

A league spokesman said it would have no comment on the plaintiffs' latest filing.

Michael Avenatti, a Los Angeles attorney representing the ticket holders, said he expects to take the depositions of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and Cowboys owner Jerry Jones before the end of the summer.

"The law permits the fans to receive 100 percent of their damages, and we intend on recovering just that," Avenatti said.

The ticket holders' filing said there is nothing on record to prove that all eligible fans received settlement offers from the NFL. Moreover, the offers had too many strings attached, including caps on the amount of compensation for meals and lodging, the filing said.

"Defendants' so-called settlement offers do not come close to making plaintiffs whole," the filing said.

The filing also reiterated the ticket holders' claim that the NFL and the Cowboys knew before the game that the temporary seats weren't ready and amounted to fraud.

"Defendants instead threw a 'Hail Mary pass' and hoped, by some miracle, the problems would somehow solve themselves and legitimate seats would magically appear," the filing said, citing e-mail and other documents publicly released by the city of Arlington after the game.

The NFL and the Cowboys said in their motion that they didn't know until just before kickoff that the seats were inadequate and that work on them continued into the afternoon on the day of the game.

Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press

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NFL files motion to dismiss players' antitrust lawsuit

The NFL filed a "motion to dismiss" the Brady et al v. National Football League et al case with the district court in Minnesota on Monday, setting up a play to shut down the antitrust suit and take away the players' biggest piece of leverage in the ongoing labor fight.

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The filing was largely a procedural matter, coming on the same day the league's response to the players' amended complaint was due. The NFL will still be responsible for filing an answer, but not until after the court rules on its motion.

U.S. District Judge Susan Richard Nelson has scheduled a hearing on the motion for Sept. 12, which is four days after the scheduled start of the NFL regular season, a factor that could put more pressure on the owners and players to get a deal done outside of the courtroom.

Both sides hope that hearing never has to happen. The NFL and its players held settlement discussions in suburban Chicago last week, but there is no sign a new collective bargaining agreement is imminent.

The NFL's motion reads: "Defendants hereby move the Court ... for an order dismissing the Brady and Eller plaintiffs' Amended Complaints for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted (in whole or in part), or, in the alternative, for an order dismissing or staying the cases under the doctrine of primary jurisdiction."

The league is moving for the antitrust case to be dismissed because of the non-statutory labor exemption, and claiming that the National Labor Relations Board must rule on its unfair labor practices charge -- which asserts the NFLPA's decertification of the union was a sham -- before it moves forward on any antitrust complaint.

Nelson ruled in favor of the players on both the non-statutory labor exemption and the NLRB's jurisdiction in April.

The U.S. 8th Circuit Court of Appeals is considering the league's case on both counts now, coming off last Friday's hearing in St. Louis, and Monday's motion sets up the league for when the case gets sent back to Nelson's court, should the appellate court rule in its favor. A ruling for the league on the non-statutory labor exemption with the 8th Circuit could prompt Nelson to dismiss the antitrust case, while a ruling for the league on the NLRB's jurisdiction could lead her to stay the case until the labor board rules.

The NLRB moved the case forward last week, pushing it from its New York office to the Division of Advice in Washington, D.C., which will consider the legal ramifications of the NFL's claims. A source with knowledge of the situation said a ruling in that matter from the NLRB is still "a ways off."

The NFL is now responsible for a more thorough explanation of its motion to dismiss, a brief that will be due August 1.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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