Media

Mark Cuban denies 2011 sexual assault allegation

Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban is denying a sexual assault allegation from nearly seven years ago after a Portland, Ore., newspaper published a story this week about a complaint that prosecutors didn’t pursue due to contradictory and insufficient evidence.

The complaint by an unidentified woman stated that Cuban had sexually assaulted her at a Portland nightclub in May 2011. 

According to the report in The Willamette Weekly, the woman claimed Cuban had “thrust his hand down the back of her jeans and penetrated her vagina with his finger” while she was taking a photo with him. 

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“It didn’t happen,” the billionaire businessman said in a Tuesday email to The Associated Press.

A police report says prosecutors decided against pursuing the case because “there is no evidence to corroborate the complainant’s statement and there is evidence contradicting the claim.”

The report also indicated the woman elected not to proceed further with her complaint.

The allegation comes after a Feb. 22 Sports Illustrated investigative report that portrayed a “corrosive” work environment for women in the Mavericks’ front office, including a characterization of it being “a real life ‘Animal House.’”

Cuban, who has openly entertained running against President Trump in 2020, is a regular panelist on the TV show “Shark Tank.”