Tim Ballard, the person whose life was dramatized within the box-office hit Sound of Freedom, has countersued former Miss Utah Amy Morgan Davis — claiming she defamed him by alleging he sexually assaulted her.
Ballard, 53, is finest identified for launching the anti-child intercourse trafficking nonprofit Operation Underground Railroad (or OUR).
He stepped down from the group in 2023 amid accusations of wrongdoing from a number of girls, which he has adamantly denied. Final 12 months, a number of girls additionally sued him.
Davis went public along with her personal allegations in The New York Times earlier this month. Ballard has not been charged with a criminal offense.
The Instances described Davis’ account of Ballard’s habits as “escalating sexual advances that included caressing her physique together with his fingers.”
In a brand new grievance in opposition to Davis, filed in Utah on Tuesday, Sept. 24, and obtained by PEOPLE, Ballard says she falsely accused him and lied about their interactions and he was now “reluctantly” compelled to reply with a go well with of his personal.
“The false claims must cease, and this lawsuit is meant to start placing a cease to them,” his grievance states. “It’s probably that Mr. Ballard will quickly be submitting related lawsuits in opposition to different false accusers.”
Ballard’s go well with paints a starkly totally different image of his relationship with Davis and alleges she deliberate to attend an OUR coaching in October 2021 to not work with the group however “with hopes of seducing Mr. Ballard.”
After Davis arrived at a deliberate coaching however didn’t attend, Ballard went to talk along with her in her resort room, based on his grievance.
“Davis had no good clarification for her lack of attendance, apart from to assert she had been working towards on her personal, and he or she spontaneously started ‘demonstrating’ her purported abilities for Mr. Ballard,” his grievance claims. “Her ‘demonstration’ quickly grew to become clearly private, and as quickly as Mr. Ballard understood Ms. Davis was trying to seduce him, he rejected the try, separated from Ms. Davis and went right down to the coaching convention room.”
After that encounter, on Oct. 16, 2021, the grievance states that Davis was requested to go away.
“She additionally falsely claims now that she was sexually assaulted by Mr. Ballard through the time of the coaching,” the grievance goes on to say. “Proof is considerable to point out this declare can be false.”
Ballard included a number of textual content messages in his go well with that he mentioned are between him and Davis throughout two conversations, in 2021 and 2022, and allegedly present she privately continued to achieve out to him regardless of now publicly saying he abused her.
Among the many messages he excerpted in his grievance was a textual content by which, he mentioned, Davis wrote that she “felt actually comfy” with him and likewise wrote: “I actually respect and admire you and cherished our connection.”
In a solution to Ballard’s grievance, obtained by PEOPLE, Davis pushed again on his claims, calling his defamation go well with “retaliation [for] being held accountable for his sexual harassment, grooming, battery and assaults.”
In a press release to PEOPLE, she mentioned Ballard had allegedly been harassing her for talking out and known as his go well with “a primary instance of this despicable habits.”
“I can’t be silenced. I can’t again down. I do know the reality, and I’ll proceed to talk out in opposition to any injustices I’ve confronted,” she mentioned.
“As a former Miss Utah, I’ve at all times strived to uphold values of advantage, integrity, honesty, and positivity. I’ve labored tirelessly to make a constructive impression and set an instance for others,” Davis went on to say. “It’s deeply disheartening to see these efforts undermined by false info and malicious intent, and I urge you to think about the supply of those accusations and the dearth of credibility behind them.”
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Within the reply to Ballard’s grievance, Davis’ lawyer says Ballard misrepresented their textual content exchanges and had tried to tug her in as a accomplice in a “{couples} ruse,” seemingly as a part of his undercover work with OUR however actually for his allegd “sexual gratification.”
Davis is searching for to have his go well with dismissed.
“Had Ballard chosen to connect all of the texts between he and the Defendant, it could be noticed that Ballard was asking Defendant to go to strip golf equipment and unique therapeutic massage parlors,” her reply states. (Ballard has been accused in a number of lawsuits of asking girls to accompany him to such areas.)
“Defendant declined,” Davis’ lawyer wrote, “as she was uncomfortable.”