After months of going back and forth, Miami Heat Dwayne Wade is turning the tables and is filing a libel lawsuit Wednesday against his estranged wife and her attorneys for claiming in a divorce filing that Wade had an adulterous affair and gave her a sexually transmitted disease.
Siohvaughn Wade said last month the player infected her with an unspecified disease in 2007. Weeks later, she withdrew the claim from the court hearing the divorce case for unknown reasons. That wasn’t enough to satisfy the 2006 NBA finals MVP, who said her allegations not only defamed him, but caused “embarrassment” and “humiliation” along with damaging future earning potential. “It has been difficult….. to see false allegations, rumors and gossip repeatedly discussed in public about my personal life,” Dwyane Wade said in a statement released to the AP. “I had no other choice but to file this action in order to clear my name.” Wade declined further comment.
The All-Star guard also lists attorneys Michael Berger and Dorene Marcus as defendants, along with their firms, contending they wronged him in the same manner as his estranged wife. The suit was filed in Chicago, where the divorce proceedings have gone on for nearly a year. “Mr. Wade has been the victim of a reckless campaign by Siohvaughn Wade and her lawyers to publicly humiliate him and damage his reputation,” Joe Power, an attorney representing the Heat player, said in a statement to the AP. “To clear the public record from these false and malicious allegations, we have filed a defamation suit in court … and will seek appropriate compensation for damages.” Siohvaughn Wade’s claim made “by and through her attorneys, and disseminated by various print and online media throughout the world placed plaintiff Dwyane Wade in a false light,” according to the lawsuit.
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