A Pima County judge will decide Thursday whether the defamation lawsuit filed by Georgia Tech basketball coach Josh Pastner against an Oro Valley man will proceed to trial in its entirety.
Ron Bell and his fiancée, Jennifer Pendley, have been locked in litigation with Pastner since February 2018, when the former Arizona Wildcats player and assistant coach filed a lawsuit against the couple saying they’d unsuccessfully tried to blackmail him over the course of several months.
In a counterclaim filed shortly after, the couple claimed that Pastner had sexually assaulted Pendley in a Houston hotel room in 2016 and groped her on several subsequent occasions. Bell and Pendley alleged there was an eyewitness to one such incident, but the person has since recanted his statement, saying the couple offered him a portion of the settlement in exchange for his false testimony.
Bell was implicated last week in an NCAA ruling against Georgia Tech, after the organization found major recruiting violations committed by Bell and another man. Bell was identified by the NCAA as a “representative of the institution’s athletic interests” and was said to have provided more than $2,000 in impermissible benefits to players between 2016 and 2017.
In Pastner’s original lawsuit, he described Bell as an overzealous fan and supporter. Bell has maintained throughout the legal proceedings that the two were in fact close personal friends and has claimed to possess “hundreds if not thousands” of email and text communications with Pastner and his wife and photos of Bell and Pendley at the Pastner family’s home, according to court documents. Bell’s filings in the lawsuit claim that he had access to Pastner and players at both Memphis and Georgia Tech. He ate meals with the team, rode on the team bus and had access to locker rooms, court documents say.
Bell’s 18-page motion for partial summary judgment details how Bell provided benefits to players Markel Crawford, Josh Okogie and Tadric Jackson to get them to commit to play on Pastner’s teams. The allegations regarding Okogie and Jackson were made public during the 2016-2017 season, Pastner’s first at Georgia Tech. The players were suspended for six and three games, respectively, for accepting improper benefits.
Pastner’s Feb. 5 response said Bell’s claims are based on nothing more than “Bell’s self-serving arguments that are grounded on inadmissible hearsay and contradicted by his own admissions.” The response goes on to say that it “appears that the motion was not filed to be successful in obtaining summary judgment, but instead as a publicity stunt in furtherance of Bell’s ongoing defamation scheme to cost Pastner his job.”
The day Bell filed his motion for partial summary judgment, he posted several comments to Twitter implying that Georgia Tech should fire Pastner, according to the response. Bell was arrested several weeks later, on Jan. 10, on charges of interfering with judicial proceedings. The tweets allegedly violated an injunction against harassment previously filed by Pastner. A ticket from the Oro Valley Police Department shows that Bell was also cited for impersonating a public servant. Bell reportedly contacted the NCAA and, claiming to be a court employee, asked officials about the lawsuit, according to court documents.
A judge can enter a summary judgment without a full trial. It can be requested by either party at any time.
Pastner’s lawyers intend to introduce “substantial” evidence during trial related to Bell’s credibility. The response cited several examples, including: Bell’s court records in Georgia and Pima County, Bell’s guilty pleas in cases involving drug possession, his attempts to obtain illegal drugs, and theft. Bell is also facing charges of impersonating an employee of the Pima County Superior Court, and has previously told multiple people that he’s a professional golfer, according to the response. Bell and Pendley’s previous lawyers quit, saying the couple lied to them about being in possession of a shirt that reportedly contained Pastner’s semen from the alleged sexual assault.
Bell has filed a separate lawsuit against Pastner and his lawyers, Scott Tompsett and Scott Palumbo, alleging abuse of process, aiding and abetting and civil conspiracy.
That suit, filed Feb. 25, claims that Pastner and his lawyers used “a number of legal processes” to interfere with Bell’s ability to defend himself against Pastner’s claims. The lawsuit lists several examples, including Bell’s March 2018 arrest on an 18-year-old warrant from Cobb County, Georgia, for an alleged probation violation. Bell spent several weeks in the Pima County jail before he was extradited to Georgia to clear up the warrant.
The lawsuit also mentions Bell’s January arrest, saying that it — like a previous arrest — occurred shortly after he filed court documents setting forth “substantial evidence relevant to Pastner’s knowledge of or acquiescence in NCAA violations.” Several pages of the lawsuit are devoted to rehashing Bell’s claims of misconduct by Pastner that were already mentioned in his motion for summary judgment. Pastner and his lawyers also violated Bell’s rights by obtaining confidential communications between Bell and his previous lawyer and possibly accessing his credit report, according to the lawsuit. Bell is asking for actual damages, special damages, punitive damages and reimbursement for costs incurred by Bell.
Last fall, a Pima County judge ruled that Bell and Pendley failed to comply with court orders in the discovery process and ordered them to pay $17,500 in legal fees to Pastner’s lawyers. The couple have blamed their previous lawyers for the delay and intend to try to offset the costs. A hearing date on that issue has yet to be set.
Editor's note: This story has been updated to remove a reference to a traffic stop.
