The Ariana Madix lawsuits, explained

Just when you think the “Scandoval” dust has settled, the love triangle that turned Bravo’s Vanderpump Rules on its head in season 10 is still locked up in litigation. First, Ariana Madix sued Tom Sandoval, and then Rachel Leviss — the “other woman” — sued Madix and Sandoval.

To refresh, Sandoval and Madix were a long-term couple in the series, but at the end of season 10, the bombshell was dropped that Sandoval and Leviss — Madix’s best friend — were having an affair. Sandoval got caught when Madix found an explicit video of Sandoval and Leviss, who was engaged to another guy, on Sandoval’s phone. The shocking revelation reached beyond the world of unscripted TV, and the Vanderpump faithful have barely recovered since then.

Madix sued Sandoval over real estate

In Jan. 2024, People reported that Ariana Madix — who naturally dumped Tom Sandoval when she found out he’d been unfaithful — sued her ex, asking a judge to force the infamous unscripted TV star to sell their Los Angeles home and divide the money in a “partition by sale.”

Despite breaking up in March 2023, Madix and Sandoval lived together in the five-bedroom, five-and-a-half-bathroom house. Madix told Scheana Shay, on her podcast Scheananigans, that she felt less pressure about it since they weren’t together. But she later said on Today with Hoda & Jenna that she was ready to move on and have a place of her own.

About a month later, Page Six said that Sandoval denied his ex’s request to sell, claiming Madix didn’t disclose “sufficient facts to state a cause of action against [Sandoval],” among other issues.

Rachel Leviss sued Madix and Sandoval for emotional distress

Amid Tom Sandoval and Ariana Madix’s real estate disagreement, “Scandoval” reared its ugly head again when Rachel Leviss brought litigation against both of them, alleging eavesdropping, revenge porn, invasion of privacy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.

According to the suit, “Scandoval” caused mayhem in Leviss’ life, “culminating in months-long in-patient treatment at a mental health facility and her departure from the show.” As a result, “Leviss was subjected to a public skewering with little precedent and became, without exaggeration, one of the most hated women in America.”

Referring to the explicit video Madix discovered, and that Leviss says was recorded without her consent, her lawyer, Mark Geragos, told Deadline, “The law makes it clear that recording someone without their consent and distributing that illegal recording is punishable by law; however, doing so while knowingly enticing them to engage in sexual acts deserves the harshest of penalties allowable under the law.”

The suit says Bravo promoted and encouraged “Scandoval” and illegally used NDAs to keep things under wraps, but the network is not named a defendant in the case.