Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, has told a U.S. court how his former US girlfriend, Autumn Spikes tried to extort $5 million from him.
Dangote filed a civil law suit against former girlfriend Spikes at a Miami-Dade County Court in Florida, United States of America.
Dangote used the pseudonym, John Doe, with AD, that stands for the ‘acronym’ for his name, Aliko Dangote, as his alias. He seeks $30,000 in damages against Ms Spikes, who in the process of exposing their relationship, showed his butt on social media.
One of the court documents filed by the plaintiff on January 22, is titled, ‘Complaint petition for declaratory judgment complaint for (about) extortion petition for injunctive relief’.
The document, among others, sighted by AirnewsOnline.com , accused Ms Spikes of libel, defamation, cyberstalking and a breach of agreement ”to keep their relationship private and off the social media”.
It stated that Mr Dangote’s “business acumen has made him a target for coercion by the defendant”, adding that Ms Spikes demanded “meritless claims of $5 million” in the nature of “palimony to which she is not legally entitled”.
Palimony is an amount of money a law court orders someone to pay regularly to a former partner whom they were living with but were not married to.
“Autumn Spikes has made a demand that the plaintiff pays her five million dollars ($5,000,000.00) as shown in Exhibit 1,” Mr Dangote’s court document states.
The affair between Mr Dangote and Ms Spikes first came to public knowledge on January 1, when the lady using the Instagram handle, Allarounda1, posted a video clip showing herself seated and Mr Dangote stretched on a couch.
The images, which went viral on social media, appeared to have been captured during their good times together.
It showed most of Mr Dangote’s body covered in an orange blanket but with his buttocks exposed while he fiddled with his phone.
Ms Spikes also shared other images of the billionaire but later deleted them.
In later updates, she said she did not make her affairs public on social media to acquire fame.
She also claimed her action was aimed at helping Mr Dangote ”clear his name of the embarrassment caused by another ex-mistress of the businessman, Bea Lewis, who exposed their intimate affairs on social media”.
Mr Dangote had tried to quickly end his relationship with Ms Spikes.
In addition to ending the relationship, he asked Ms Spikes for a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) about their affair.
Ms Spikes demanded $5 million, through her representatives, in exchange for the NDA.
The demand was followed by an email by Mr Dangote’s lawyer, Mr Fleisher, to Ms Spikes’ lawyer, Paul Petruzzi, on January 13, asking for “the basis of Ms Spikes’ demand”.
Responding to Mr Fleisher’s email, Mr Petruzzi described the affair between his client and the billionaire as “an ongoing initimate relationship for nearly the entire past decade since she was pretty young”.
Mr Petruzzi added in the email that ” the relationship was quite involved and pretty interesting” and insisted that Mr Dangote must pay his client the sum of $5 million in exchange for the NDA.
He stated, “For whatever reason, your client broke off the relationship as soon as one of his other ‘conquests’ broke her silence.
“Your client now wants my client to sign an NDA and, through his representatives, offered her money to do so.
“While I appreciate your client’s desire to continue to exercise his control over mine, she will only agree to the NDA proposed by your client in exchange for the lump sum of 5 million dollars.”
Mr Dangote filed the email exchange as Exhibit 1 in his suit.
The wealthy man noted in his suit that Ms Spikes had in the past requested financial assistance from him to start up a business.
He said he agreed to grant her the assistance on the condition that it would remain confidential.
His court document read in part, “Autumn Spikes demanded from the plaintiff assistance as an entrepreneur in a start-up business when there was no loan commitment, nor oral or written promise.
“The plaintiff once announced an oral willingness to provide entrepreneurial assistance to Autumn Spikes on the condition that it be confidential and private.”
He said he later started seeing social media posts and planned media talk shows “done to expose him and make his life miserable if he fails to comply with the demand for $5,000,000.”
“John Doe’s generosity toward Autumn Spikes, if any, has been breached by Autumn Spikes’ exposure and solicitations to talk show media if he fails to pay her meritless demands,” he added.
Mr Dangote said his “generosity toward Autumn Spikes, if any, has been breached by Autumn Spikes’ exposure and solicitations to media talk shows if he fails to pay her meritless demands.”
He maintained that ”he had the right to stop being generous to her and demand a refund of the funds he had given her to assist her business in the past”.
