Plaintiffs have successfully served Shaquille O’Neal after months of attempts by the law firm representing investors in a class-action lawsuit against the bankrupt FTX cryptocurrency exchange.
According to attorney Adam Moskowitz’s office, O’Neal, 51, was served on Sunday afternoon outside his residence. Moskowitz stated that the Inside the NBA host had been evading process servers for the past three months, describing O’Neal’s actions as a “silly sideshow.”
Moskowitz expressed disappointment over O’Neal’s behavior, noting, “We were mainly just disappointed by Mr. O’Neal’s actions, because he has done so many wonderful volunteer efforts, for the police in Florida, as well as here in Miami.
It was such a disappointment to waste so much time and resources on this sideshow and hope Mr. O’Neal hires counsel and just follows the law.”
O’Neal, along with other celebrities such as Tom Brady, Gisele Bündchen, Steph Curry, Naomi Osaka, and Larry David, was named as a defendant in a class-action lawsuit filed in Florida last November.
The lawsuit claims that the use of celebrity endorsements misled investors into putting money into the now-bankrupt FTX crypto exchange.
Since retiring from the NBA in 2011, O’Neal has become a well-known commercial spokesperson in the U.S., appearing in various advertisements and campaigns for FTX.
However, following the controversy and bankruptcy of the crypto exchange, O’Neal has attempted to distance himself from the company. “A lot of people think I’m involved, but I was just a paid spokesperson for a commercial,” O’Neal told in December.
Moskowitz’s office has criticized the now-defunct FTX company as a “fraud” and, labeled it “a massive Ponzi scheme” that exploited celebrities to attract investors.
The office has reported that O’Neal refused to open his door and that security guards outside TNT’s studio in Atlanta denied entry to the process servers attempting to deliver the legal notice.
Forbes reported last month that Moskowitz’s office had engaged four different servicing companies in recent months to attempt to deliver the notice to O’Neal.
Federal prosecutors have accused FTX of using billions of dollars of investors’ money for personal expenses, describing it as “one of the biggest financial frauds in American history.” Sam Bankman-Fried, the founder of FTX, was arrested in December.
