Former child star Raquel Lee has filed a lawsuit against Disney, saying she was raped by an ex-employee at age 14. According to Variety, Lee said in her lawsuit that the assault happened in 2001 when she was working on the movie The Poof Point. Separately, The Hollywood Reporter has revealed that Lee reached a confidential 2015 settlement with actor Mark Curry, who played her father in the film, years before she filed suit against Disney.
Who is named in Raquel Lee’s lawsuit against Disney?
Filing her lawsuit on Friday in Los Angeles, Lee raised allegations of negligence against Disney and said the male employee groomed her while they were shooting the film.
Lee said the middle-aged male employee assaulted her several times in a hotel as the cast was staying in Salt Lake City, then abused her again as they were flying back to California. She also named the director of the film, Neal Israel, who allegedly told her to “bond with, get close to, and trust” the accused employee.
“Disney authorized sexual harassment on set, permitting sexualized jokes, commentary, fondling, and excessive touching,” the lawsuit stated, per Variety. “[The employee] regularly made sexually explicit jokes and commentary on the set of a children’s movie and around children. No one from Disney even attempted to curb Mr. Doe’s inappropriate and sexualized commentary.”
Lee said she was “exhausted, often intoxicated, hungover, or vomiting on set” after facing abuse and being pressured to consume alcohol. Disney, however, failed to provide medical care, the lawsuit stated.
The former Proud Family star said “multiple Disney executives” accused her of “being ‘out of control'” and blamed her for “causing the movie to go ‘haywire.'” They also said she “needs Jesus” and has “a demon inside her,” the lawsuit stated. Lee added that Disney denied her a production role after The Poof Point.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, the lawsuit states that the accused employee “regularly whispered sexually explicit and harassing comments” to Lee in front of the cast and crew, but “no one at Disney intervened.”
According to THR’s more detailed account of the filing, Lee’s assigned on-set guardian was separated from her “for the vast majority of each day,” and the harassment allegedly occurred “in plain view” of coworkers, including sound technicians managing the cast’s microphones.
Lee contends that Disney executives responded to her “changed behavior and trauma response” not with support, but by eventually canceling her role in a future production with the studio.
In the years following, Lee had very few on-screen roles, but went on to spend multiple seasons as a voice actor on the animated Disney Channel sitcom The Proud Family, and more recently reprised that role in the revival series, The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder.
Raquel Lee’s undisclosed 2015 settlement with Mark Curry
Days after the lawsuit was reported in the press, The Hollywood Reporter later revealed on Monday that Lee reached a confidential settlement agreement in 2015 with actor Mark Curry, who played her father in The Poof Point. Civil rights attorney Gloria Allred, “known for representing accusers against prominent individuals in sexual misconduct claims,” per The Hollywood Reporter, represented Lee in that private resolution.
According to the outlet, Lee, Curry and Allred did not respond to or declined to comment on the settlement. Disney has similarly declined to comment on Lee’s current litigation against the company.
Curry, who was 40 years old at the time The Poof Point was filmed, is best known for starring in ABC’s 1990s sitcom Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper, which ran for five seasons as part of the network’s TGIF lineup.
What did Raquel Lee and her lawyers say about the history of accusations against Disney?
Lee said in her lawsuit that Disney has a long history of enabling and ignoring sexual abuse.
“This is not the first time that Disney has enabled a sexual predator to target and abuse vulnerable victims,” the lawsuit stated, per The Hollywood Reporter.
In the 2024 docuseries Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, Lee raised similar concerns, opening up about how she was treated as a Black child actress on Nickelodeon’s The Amanda Show. She did not discuss her The Poof Point allegations as part of that docuseries. However, after it aired, Lee said that fellow child star Drake Bell’s disclosure of his own on-set sexual abuse was “retraumatizing” for her.
Lee’s attorney in the Disney litigation, Doug Wigdor, is a plaintiffs’ employment and sexual-misconduct specialist whose past clients include Cassie Ventura in her accusations against Sean “Diddy” Combs, as well as a group of women who accused Harvey Weinstein of misconduct.
“Over the last decade, countless child actors have come forward to bravely share their experiences of abuse by adults in entertainment,” Lee’s attorneys Douglas Wigdor and Jane Kim said in a statement, per People. “As former government prosecutors, our message to the entertainment industry is simple: This conduct is inexcusable, and those involved — directly or indirectly — must be held accountable.”