A lawsuit involving the Miraval Winery, jointly owned by Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, has revealed new allegations by Ms. Jolie that Mr. Pitt abused her and their children before the 2016 plane flight that made the initial allegations public.
Ms. Jolie filed a motion in a Los Angeles court on Thursday saying that Mr. Pitt demanded she sign a non-disclosure agreement that “prohibited Jolie from speaking (other than in court) about Pitt’s abuse of Jolie and their children by attempting to tie Pitt’s personal reputation to Miraval’s business.”
Her filing is related to a 2022 lawsuit by Mr. Pitt that claimed he and Ms. Jolie had an agreement that neither one of them would sell their stake in the winery without the other’s permission.
He also filed in June 2023 that her attempt to sell her stake was “vindictive” because of an “adverse custody hearing.”
“At trial, Jolie will prove through testimony, emails, photographs, and other evidence why Pitt was so concerned about his own misconduct that he blew up his own deal to purchase Jolie’s interest in Miraval because she refused to agree to his new, expansive NDA,” the filing read.
Ms. Jolie said in the filing that she was willing to sign an NDA “limited to not disparaging Miraval’s wine business” and they were close to a deal for Mr. Pitt to buy her stake when he made new demands for an expanded NDA covering the alleged abuse.
Ms. Jolie’s attorney Paul Murphy said in a statement: “Mr. Pitt refused to purchase Ms. Jolie’s interest when she would not be silenced by his NDA. By refusing to buy her interest but then suing her, Mr. Pitt put directly at issue why that NDA was so important to him and what he hoped it would bury: his abuse of Ms. Jolie and their family. After eight months of delays, this motion asks the Court to force Mr. Pitt to finally produce that evidence.”
Ms. Jolie also said in the filing that Mr. Pitt’s “history of physical abuse of Jolie started well before the family’s September 2016 plane trip from France to Los Angeles.” She did not provide more details about the alleged abuse.
In 2016, when the FBI investigated the incident on the plane, Mr. Pitt was not arrested or charged with any abuse in the incident.
“(Jolie’s) story continues to evolve each time she tells it. Brad has accepted responsibility for what he did but will not for things he didn’t do,” his representative said at the time.
She alleged that he shook her and pushed her up against an airplane bathroom wall, then choked one of the children and struck another child in the face.
“Some of the children pleaded with Pitt to stop. They were all frightened. Many were crying,” her filing alleged.
The allegations are more detailed than had been made public previously.
Mr. Pitt called the allegations made in the 2022 filing “completely untrue.”
Ms. Jolie sold her half stake in Miraval to Tenute del Mondo, a subsidiary of Stoli Group, controlled by Russian oligarch Yuri Shefler, in October 2021, prompting the lawsuit.
The ongoing legal proceedings and “Pitt’s unyielding attempts to control and punish Jolie continue to take a huge emotional and financial toll on her and their family,” the filing read. “Jolie longs for their family to be able to heal and their children to be spared further pain and trauma, and truly wishes Pitt would want the same too.”
Miraval is located in the south of France and was purchased by Mr. Pitt and Ms. Jolie in 2008 when they were married.
Ms. Jolie filed for divorce from Mr. Pitt in 2016, and they were declared legally single in 2019. They worked out a joint custody arrangement through court involvement in 2021.
Her attorneys said that she sold her part of the winery in order to have “financial independence” from Mr. Pitt.
