In a lawsuit, Angelina Jolie accuses Brad Pitt of physically abusing her

It’s been over seven years since Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie ended their relationship, a two-year marriage that followed a decade-long courtship. After that came the revelations, such as Jolie’s accusations that Pitt had mistreated their children. A serious incident on a private plane, which the FBI even investigated, set off alarm bells. Now that the couple is completely estranged (they have been legally separated for five years) and their children are coming of age, Jolie is accusing Pitt not only of physically abusing their children but also herself.

The new lawsuit became public on Thursday afternoon, and it is related to the years-long battle between Pitt, 60, and Jolie, 48, over a vineyard in France, the so-called Chateau Miraval. In 2022, the actor sued his ex-wife for selling them without his consent and for purposely damaging the reputation of his winery. Now, the Maleficent star is suing her ex-husband, alleging that when she offered to sell him her part of the winery, he refused to buy it unless the actress accepted a “more onerous” and “expansive” confidentiality agreement, as reported by People and Page Six, who have had access to the lawsuit. In addition, the lawsuit states that Pitt had been physically abusing Jolie for years.

“While Pitt’s history of physical abuse of Jolie started well before the family’s September 2016 plane trip from France to Los Angeles, this flight marked the first time he turned his physical abuse on the children as well. Jolie then immediately left him,” the document reads. The lawsuit explains that the confidentiality agreement Pitt allegedly demanded from Jolie sought to cover up his “personal misconduct, whether related to Miraval or not,” in order to prevent her from ever speaking out about the alleged assaults.

According to Jolie’s lawyers, Pitt’s defense team intended to “contractually obligate” the actress to remain silent after learning that she submitted a sealed dossier with “emails, summaries of the family’s expected testimony and other evidence” to help her obtain custody of her children in 2021. That’s when Pitt reportedly agreed to buy Jolie’s shares in the French winery from her, but, according to the new legal documents, backed out when he feared those sealed documents “could become public.”

The lawsuit also explains why the actress never pressed charges against her partner. It claims that “she believed the best course was for Pitt to accept responsibility and help the family recover from the post-traumatic stress he caused.”

In a statement to Page Six, the actress’ lawyer, Paul Murphy, said that “Mr. Pitt refused to purchase Ms. Jolie’s interest when she would not be silenced by his NDA… By refusing to buy her interest but then suing her, Mr. Pitt put directly at issue why that NDA was so important to him and what he hoped it would bury: his abuse of Ms. Jolie and their family,” the lawyer said, referring to the lawsuit Pitt filed against Jolie in February 2022 for selling her shares in the winery to another party.

Another source close to Jolie tells People that she “does not want to be raising any of these facts, and she is doing it only because Pitt’s lawsuit against her is forcing her to defend herself.” They add that the actress doesn’t want to go to trial, but if it does “[Jolie] will be forced to use that evidence in the trial whether she wants to or not.”

For their part, Pitt’s lawyers have declined to comment on the matter, although sources on his side have told both People and Page Six that “this is a pattern of behavior — whenever there is a decision that goes against the other side they consistently choose to introduce misleading, inaccurate and/or irrelevant information as a distraction.” This time they are also downplaying Jolie’s accusations by asserting that she “continually tries to distract from legal losses by offering irrelevant or inaccurate information.”

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