{"id":129797,"date":"2018-09-18T11:17:33","date_gmt":"2018-09-18T15:17:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thedetroitbureau.com\/?p=129797"},"modified":"2018-09-18T11:17:33","modified_gmt":"2018-09-18T15:17:33","slug":"careful-what-you-ask-for-musk-sued-by-diver-he-disparaged","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/2018\/09\/careful-what-you-ask-for-musk-sued-by-diver-he-disparaged\/","title":{"rendered":"Careful What You Ask For: Musk Sued by Diver He Disparaged"},"content":{"rendered":"
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After pushing for lawsuit from diver Vern Unsworth, Tesla CEO Elon Musk got what he wanted \u2013 in London and Los Angeles.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Adding to the many headaches facing Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO has now been sued by a British diver that he has accused of being a pedophile.<\/p>\n

In July, the 47-year-old executive got into a Twitter war with Vernon Unsworth earlier this year when Musk offered to send a mini-sub to help rescue members of a youth soccer team trapped in a flooded Thai cave. Unsworth derided it as a publicity stunt and suggested Musk shove the sub where the sun doesn\u2019t shine.<\/p>\n

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News You Can Trust!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Musk responded by declaring Unsworth \u201cpedo guy,\u201d slang for a pedophile. \u201cSorry pedo guy, you really did ask for it,\u201d Musk tweeted to his 22.5 million followers. He followd it up adding, \u201cBet ya a signed dollar it\u2019s true.\u201d Musk also declared that, \u201cI fucking hope he sues me.\u201d<\/p>\n

While Musk subsequently apologized, he apparently couldn\u2019t let go of the tiff, responding to a tweet from one of his followers by questions why Unsworth hadn\u2019t yet sued him. \u201cYou don\u2019t think it\u2019s strange he hasn\u2019t sued me?\u201d\u00a0Musk said in a late August tweet. \u201cHe was offered free legal services.\u201d<\/p>\n

(Musk lights up \u2013 but Tesla shareholders are turned off. <\/em>Click Here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0for the story.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

As if to make sure that would happen, Musk amped up his attack, declaring the diver a \u201cchild rapist.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Musk's use of social media has begun to raise concerns, such as when he had to apologize to a driver involved in the rescue of kids caught in a flooded Thai cave.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

In an e-mail sent to BuzzFeed, he went further, saying of Unsworth, \u201cHe\u2019s an old, single white guy from England who\u2019s been traveling or living in Thailand for 30 to 40 years,\u201d adding that the diver went to Thailand \u201cfor a child bride who was about 12 years old at the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unsworth is now doing precisely what Musk asked for. He has filed legal actions in both London \u2013 where libel laws are relatively easy to pursue, as well as in a federal court in Los Angeles where he is seeking at least $75,000 in damages and a court order barring Musk from making further comments.<\/p>\n

\u201cElon Musk falsely accused Vern Unsworth of being guilty of heinous crimes,\u201d the Brit\u2019s lawyer, L. Lin Wood said in a statement. \u201cMusk\u2019s influence and wealth cannot convert his lies into truth or protect him from accountability for his wrongdoing in a court of law.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the 65 pages of paperwork filed in Los Angeles, the suit charges that Musk attempted to destroy Unsworth\u2019s reputation \u201cby publishing false and heinous accusations of criminality against him to the public.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among other things, the L.A. lawsuit declares, \u201cMr. Unsworth is not a pedophile (and) has never engaged in an act of pedophilia. Mr. Unsworth is not a child rapist,\u201d it added, pointing out that his \u201csignificant other\u201d is a 40-year-old woman with whom he shares a home in Thailand.<\/p>\n

(<\/em>Click Here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0for more about Musk lamenting the \u201cexcruciating\u201d pressures at Tesla<\/em><\/strong>.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Unsworth, it notes, was a regular visitor to that country where he explored and mapped cave. He came to prominence earlier this year when the youth soccer team fled into a cave to avoid a storm, only to find the exits flooded. Unsworth was part of a rescue team that eventually led all of the team members to safety \u2013 though one diver died in the process.<\/p>\n

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After apologizing for calling Unsworth a pedophile, Musk couldn't help but play with fire, suggesting again the diver was a pedophile because he hadn't sued him \u2014 yet.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Musk offered to send a mini-sub to help get them out, though members of the team said it would not work in the conditions they found. Unsworth derided the offer as a publicity stunt as told Musk to shove the sub into his lower anatomy as their war of words escalated.<\/p>\n

Unsworth did not participate in the final rescue dives because he didn\u2019t have enough experience, but did help in the planning of the mission.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit adds another chapter to what some critics have seen as a meltdown by Musk in recent months. Among other things, he told a reporter for the New York Times that the last year has been \u201cexcruciating,\u201d and predicted \u201cthe worst is yet to come.\u201d<\/p>\n

He may be right, at least from a legal standpoint. Musk is personally facing an investigation by the SEC looking into his brief attempt to take Tesla private. The automaker is also a target.<\/p>\n

(Musk raises new concerns about leadership by publicly reviving old spat.\u00a0<\/em>Click Here<\/a><\/span>\u00a0for the story.)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Tesla is also locked in a legal battle with a former employee it accuses of being a saboteur but who has positioned himself as a whistleblower.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Adding to the many headaches facing Elon Musk, the Tesla CEO has now been sued by a British diver that he has accused of being a pedophile, after pushing the topic for several months. The suits were filed in London and Los Angeles by Vernon Unsworth. Get the story at TheDetroitBureau.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":128760,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7,8,5,11],"tags":[],"make":[110],"post-state":[],"category_old":[150,151,123,299,169,138,132,125,207,288],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129797"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=129797"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/129797\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/128760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=129797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=129797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=129797"},{"taxonomy":"make","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/make?post=129797"},{"taxonomy":"post-state","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/post-state?post=129797"},{"taxonomy":"category_old","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thedetroitbureau.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/category_old?post=129797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}