HOUSTON – Another former Houston Texans Cheerleader has been added as a co-plaintiff in the ongoing labor litigation against the NFL franchise, claiming the cheerleading squad’s coach forced her to wear duct tape.
Houston federal court records show that Angelina Rosa on June 22 joined the lawsuit filed by prominent women’s rights attorney Gloria M. Allred on behalf of ex-Texans Cheerleaders Hannah Turnbow, Ainsley Parish, Morgan Wiederhold, Ashley Rodriguez, and Kelly Neuner.
The women allege the Texans underpaid them, as well as failed to address their complaints about mistreatment during their respective tenures as cheerleaders.
“Complaints regarding discrepancies in paychecks were ignored and threats of dismissal or consequences for voicing complaints were enough to silence even the staunchest of critics,” court papers submitted earlier this month say.
The plaintiffs further state that “they were subjected to intense scrutiny, harassment, threats of physical assaults, actual assaults by spectators, and cyberbullying by the coach and her staff.”
In a revised version of the original petition, Rosa claims that squad manager Alto Gary and her staff assaulted her “by taking duct tape and physically taping down her sides under her uniform without her consent.”
“Alto (Gary) then proceeded to dangle the duct tape in front of the team, including the other the plaintiffs, during a game, threatening them that ‘they were next’,” the amended complaint says. “The plaintiffs were in a constant state of fear around Alto (Gary), anxiously anticipating whether they would be the next one subjected to her physical assaults.”
Rosa entered the legal fray shortly after the Texans demanded the complainants’ allegations be dismissed.
According to the team, the women “signed valid employment agreements with (it) that contain mandatory arbitration provisions” and “(they) themselves acknowledge the validity of these agreements in their original complaint.”
Houston Division of the Southern District of Texas Case No. 4:18-CV-1797