Blac Chyna loses $100M lawsuit against Kardashians
After two weeks of dramatic testimony — and just two days of deliberations — the $100 million trial pitting Blac Chyna against the Kardashians has ended, with a Los Angeles jury siding with the reality TV family in a resounding repudiation of claims made by the model, whose real name is Angela White. The verdict was announced on Monday afternoon, as Kardashian family members were 3,000 miles away in New York City to attend the annual Met Gala.
As TMZ reported, the court clerk asked the family attorney where they were, to which the attorney responded, "at some gala."
Chyna filed her suit in 2017 alleging that the family defamed her and conspired to get Rob & Chyna, the 2016 reality show that she did with former fiancé Rob Kardashian, off the air and ruin her career. Meanwhile, the defense had argued that the couple's breakup was to blame for the end of the show.
While Chyna's lawsuit initially included Rob — the father of her 5-year-old daughter, Dream, and whom she was engaged to in 2016 — her allegations against him, including assault and revenge porn for posting explicit photos of her online, will be dealt with in a separate trial. In this case, her allegations pertained to Rob's sisters Kim Kardashian, Khloé Kardashian and Kylie Jenner, as well as his mom, Kris Jenner.
On Friday, a judge reportedly removed Kim from the lawsuit. Her lawyer had argued that none of the comments Kim had made about Chyna in communications with E! executives or her family members had been defamatory, and Judge Gregory Alarcon agreed. The other women were still named.
Here are some of the more notable moments that went down in court during the trial:
Rob Kardashian says Blac Chyna put a gun to his head and tried to kill him
He alleged that she had held the gun, strangled him with a cord from a phone-charger and hit him with a 6-foot metal rod in a much discussed December 2016 incident. "She tried to kill me," Rob told the court during his testimony on April 27.
In all, he said Chyna had beat him at least five times.
Chyna's attorney argued that Rob had not show any signs of a beating the day after she allegedly hit him, asking, "Did you have as much as a Band-Aid on you?"
"I just told you it didn't leave a mark on my face!" Rob responded. "And the gun to my head two different times during the night didn't leave a mark to my temple!"
Chyna had testified previously that she was never violent toward him. Her attorney said that, if he had really thought his life was in danger, he would not have left their daughter in the house.
Blac Chyna says wrapping cord around Rob's neck was a joke
"I came up behind him, doing that jokingly," Chyna said under oath on April 20. "I just went like this to get his attention." He had been playing a video game. She said the move came on Dec. 14, 2016, the day they found out their E! reality show had received the go-ahead for a second season. However, the Rob & Chyna baby special that aired four days later would be the last of the episodes. She also recalled that she had picked up an unloaded gun that he kept on his dresser while he was on FaceTime with a friend, and Rob understood that she hadn't meant any harm.
Rob's mom had a much different story. According to her, the violent fight between the two left him rattled. "He was a mess," Kris said in tears, noting that daughter Kim had been held at gun point in Paris just two months earlier. "I could only imagine how he felt."
Corey Gamble says he saw Blac Chyna strike Rob
On April 27, Kris's partner, Corey Gamble, testified that he witnessed Chyna punching Rob and hitting him with a cord from a phone-charger. It happened Dec. 15, 2016, when he rushed to the couple's residence, after Kris had received a call from her son. When Gamble arrived, he said, he watched Chyna throw down a metal rod, then punch Rob and hit him with a cord.
"By the time she got to him, she started hitting him," he said on the stand. "I was able to get in the middle of them two. I even got hit two or three times."
Kylie Jenner testifies that Tyga told her Blac Chyna attacked him... and Chyna had once threatened her
Kylie's ex Tyga, who once dated Chyna and shares a son with her, had told her that a 6-inch scar on his arm was from Chyna, Kylie testified. Still, she noted, she didn't witness anything herself, just heard about what had supposedly happened.
She also said that she'd once received "threatening" texts from Chyna, although she hadn't considered them to be serious and hadn't reported them to police. Kylie's mom confirmed that she had been told about the incident and hypothesized that Chyna was upset with Kylie because she was with Tyga.
Blac Chyna reveals what ended her relationship with Rob
The model said her partner's jealousy caused them to split. She cited that Dec. 15 altercation, when she said that Rob took her phone and shut himself in a closet to see if she had been contacting other men. She then smashed a nearby gingerbread house and TV, although she insisted that she didn't hit Rob. "In the past there had been a cycle of him taking my phone and posting things from it," she said, "and I was really getting sick of it."
Rob Kardashian declares he never loved Blac Chyna
In fact, Rob told the jury, he was at his "weakest" when he met her.
"I was probably at the worst place in my entire life," he said. "She was catching me at my lowest."
He insisted that he hadn't loved her.
"It was not real love," he said. "Otherwise, we would've been married."
Chyna had disrespected his family "a hundred different ways," he added, including when she did not attend a baby shower they threw for her.
Kris and Kylie Jenner and Khloé Kardashian had urged producers and E! execs to end Rob & Chyna
Emails and text messages presented showed the three asking that the show be ended following that Dec. 2016 violence. For instance, Kylie had sent an email to execs insisting that Chyna would "proceed with using and physically abusing my brother," while Kris told the Rob & Chyna showrunner that Chyna had beat "the s*** out of Rob's face."
However, former E! President Adam Stotsky told the court that the three "don't have the authority to actually do that."
Kim Kardashian had refused to film with Chyna
Although she's been cleared in the lawsuit, Kim did say that she had demanded that Chyna be kept off Keeping Up with the Kardashians after she heard about her alleged altercations. "I will not go into a toxic work environment," she told the court on April 26. "On my own show, I have the power to do that."
Pete Davidson makes an appearance
Kim's Saturday Night Live beau sat in the courtroom during closing arguments and even gave her a kiss. While that appearance was unexpected, it wasn't exactly shocking, since the two have been inseparable since they were first seen together in October 2021.