Bryan Callen is suing the husband of a woman who claimed that he raped her, arguing that the man is out to destroy his career.
On Wednesday, Callen filed a complaint in Los Angeles Superior Court alleging that Gabriel Tigerman has launched an “ongoing campaign to destroy (the comic’s) livelihood” via “threats, harassment and intimidation of third parties that dare contact him.”
Tigerman is married to Katherine Fiore Tigerman, who in July told The Los Angeles Times that in 1999, Callen held her down on a bed and forced her to have sex with him.
She is one of four women accusing him of sexually inappropriate behaviour. The other three are Rachel Green, Tiffany King and Claire Ganshert.
Callen has taken a leave of absence from his podcast, “The Fighter and the Kid,” Callen and was also dropped by his Hollywood representatives, the Creative Artists Agency and Innovative Artists, in August.
Callen, an alumni of ABC’s “The Goldbergs” and “Schooled,” was also set to make a Netflix prank show with comic Chris D’Elia — but the program was scrapped after D’Elia was accused of sexual misconduct in June.
In a statement provided to the L.A. Times by his lawyer, Andrew Baum, Callen said he filed the lawsuit because “I take my innocence, reputation and right to due process very seriously, and I will not stand by while someone tries to destroy my livelihood over something I did not do.”
When the allegations first surfaced, Callen denied them vehemently.
“Let me be very clear: I have never raped, forced myself upon any woman nor offered to trade stage time for sex. EVER,” he shared in a statement.
“I know the truth. And I can only hold my head high, remain true to myself, my family, my audience and know that I will not allow the cancel culture to subvert what I know and as importantly, what they know, is the truth.”
Meanwhile, Gabriel Tigerman has started a GoFundMe page to raise funds for his legal battle with Callen.
“The @latimes ran a story about Bryan Callen with accusations of sexual misconduct by four women. One of them was my wife, Katherine, who described how Bryan raped her. Yesterday, Bryan sued me for defending my wife. I need your help to fight back,” he wrote on twitter.