In a way, one can’t help but admire her audacity. As was reported by BuzzFeed News on February 24, Jennifer McBride, the woman who returned Lady Gaga’s stolen French bulldogs after a violent dognapping in February 2021, is suing the Grammy- and Oscar-winning performer for the $500,000 in reward money the star promised for the return of the prized pooches. The lawsuit claims that Gaga “defrauded” McBride “by making a promise without intent to perform” and goes on to say that she has suffered pain and suffering, mental anguish, and a loss of enjoyment of life as a result of not receiving the cash.
There is, of course, a bit of a twist to all this: After McBride turned the dogs over to the LAPD’s Olympic Community Police Station, it was later discovered that she had a relationship with the group who planned the heist. Indeed, she was one of the five arrested after the incident and was sentenced to two years of probation.
And lest you think this was just a victimless affair of grabbing someone else’s pets for a little while, it most certainly was not. Gaga’s dog walker, Ryan Fischer, was shot four times in the chest during the theft. Thankfully, he survived, but among the charges McBride was arrested on was accessory attempted murder. (She pleaded no contest to the charge of receiving stolen property.)
TMZ has further reported that LA County Deputy District Attorney Michelle Hanisee believes McBride was “more than aware the pups were stolen when she returned them in hopes of obtaining the reward, and had known the men involved in the shooting for years.”
The man who pulled the trigger, James Howard Jackson, was sentenced to 21 years in prison last December. During the sentencing Ryan Fischer said he had suffered repeated collapsed lungs and a loss of career and friendships, but he did forgive his attacker. In an earlier interview with CBS, Fischer said that Gaga had done “so much” to help as he recovered, and he even “stayed at her house for months while friends comforted me and security was around me.”
This article was originally published by Vanity Fair. The publication has reached out to Lady Gaga for further comment and this story may be updated.
