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Sofia Vergara ex-fiance opposes her testimony at upcoming trial
Entertainment Oct 06, 2022
Cosmopolitan UK - YouTube: Golden Globes 2020: Best dressed celebrities on the red carpet ; Cosmopolitan UK – View/save archived versions on archive.org and archive.today (See specific archived version)Sofia Vergara at Golden Globes Red Carpet 2020CC BY 3.0
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Sofia Vergara’s former fiance — who sued the Beverly Hills reproductive center where the ex-couple had embryos created in anticipation of having a family — does not want the ex-“Modern Family” star testifying during the upcoming trial of his suit against the facility.
In the negligence suit filed in Los Angeles Superior Court in June 2020, Nick Loeb says he and Vergara began their relationship in 2010, became engaged in 2012 and subsequently started discussing plans to have a family. They agreed to create embryos at ART Reproductive Services LLC through in-vitro fertilization, according to his court papers.
After the first round of IVF, a surrogate mother was unable to produce a child with two embryos, so Loeb and Vergara consulted with ART about a second round of treatments in November 2013 that produced two more embryos, according to Loeb. However, ART did not provide Loeb and Vergara with the chance to decide what would happen to the embryos if the couple separated or if storage fees went unpaid, a violation of the state Health & Safety Code, according to Loeb.
ART attorneys have listed Vergara as a witness in their case and they told Judge Stephen I. Goorvitch during a Sept. 29 hearing that they expect her to say she had not, and would not, consent to having the embryos implanted in a surrogate, and that she and Loeb had discussed what would happen to the embryos in the event of a break up.
But in court papers filed Tuesday, Loeb’s lawyers say his former flame’s testimony would be irrelevant.
“In this case, (ART) failed to provide the partners with a form dealing with the disposition of the embryos in the event of a separation,” Loeb’s lawyers argue in their court papers. “There is no testimony that Ms. Vergara can give that would have a tendency to prove that the defendant provided this form and secured the partners’ signatures.”
Vergara’s testimony also would be “highly prejudicial” to Loeb, his lawyers further argue in their court papers.
“Ms. Vergara is a highly loved and well-known celebrity who has 26.8 million-plus followers on Instagram,” more than the states of Louisiana, Kentucky, Oregon, Oklahoma, Connecticut, Utah, Nevada, Iowa, Arkansas, Mississippi, Kansas, New Mexico, Idaho, Nebraska, West Virginia, Hawaii, New Hampshire, Maine, Montana, Rhode Island, Delaware, South Dakota, North Dakota, Alaska and Washington D.C. combined,” Loeb’s attorneys state in their court papers.
Allowing Vergara to testify against Loeb, with whom she has been engaged in extensive litigation, would showcase her “anger, hatred and dislike” for him and would “taint him in the eyes of the jury with a star power that he could not mitigate,” Loeb’s attorneys further state in their court papers.
On Oct. 18, the judge is scheduled to hold a hearing on pretrial motions and also set a date for trial.
In one of the separate legal actions between Vergara and Loeb, the actress, now 50, sued Loeb in February 2016, seeking a court order declaring that any attempts by Loeb, now 47, to bring the embryos to term would be a breach of their original contract. Vergara won that case in February 2021.
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