Judge Strikes ‘Improper’ Letter from Justin Baldoni’s Lawyers Claiming Blake Lively Pressured Taylor Swift

A judge has granted Blake Lively‘s request to strike a letter and affidavit from Justin Baldoni‘s legal team, regarding Taylor Swift.

Judge Lewis J. Liman granted the motion on Thursday, May 15, calling Bryan Freedman‘s letter and affidavit “improper” and “irrelevant to any issue before this Court.” He added, “Counsel is advised that future misuse of the Court’s docket may be met with sanctions.”

Says a rep for Lively, “It took the court less than 24 hours to see through Mr. Freedman’s irrelevant, improper and inflammatory accusations, strike them, remove them from the court and warn Mr. Freedman that further misconduct may be met with sanctions.”

Freedman asserted in his letter to Judge Liman on Wednesday, May 14, that a “source who is highly likely to have reliable information” told him that Lively’s lawyers allegedly made “extortionate threats” to the law firm representing Swift, 35.

the letter, allegations included a claim that Lively’s attorneys demanded Swift “release a statement of support” for Lively, 37 — as well as “intimating that if Ms. Swift refused to do so, private text messages of a personal nature in Ms. Lively’s possession would be released.”

In the letter, submitted amid Baldoni’s request to subpoena Swift, Freedman also claimed to have received a tip from the anonymous source alleging that Lively asked Swift to delete text messages.

Freedman alleged that they were also informed that Swift’s lawyer responded to Lively’s attorney and “addressed these inappropriate and apparently extortionate threats … ” He added, “It is those communications that the Wayfarer Parties seek to obtain” as potential evidence of “an attempt to intimidate and coerce a percipient witness in this litigation.”

In a statement to PEOPLE, Lively’s attorney Mike Gottlieb responded, “This is categorically false. We unequivocally deny all of these so-called allegations, which are cowardly sourced to supposed anonymous sources, and completely untethered from reality.”

Added Gottlieb, “This is what we have come to expect from the Wayfarer parties’ lawyers, who appear to love nothing more than shooting first, without any evidence, and with no care for the people they are harming in the process.”

“We will imminently file motions with the court to hold these attorneys accountable for their misconduct here,” he concluded.

In a subsequent letter to the judge, Lively’s legal team called for Freedman’s letter to be tossed out, writing, “The apparent intent of the Freedman Letter is to launder scandalous and defamatory allegations about Ms. Lively and opposing counsel into the press by abusing the Court’s docket.”

However, on Thursday, Freedman doubled down on his claim, this time filing a signed affidavit under the penalty of perjury to shed more light on his unnamed source and more details about the allegations.

In the affidavit, Freedman claimed to have had an hourlong phone call on Valentine’s Day, Feb. 14, with a “person very closely linked to Taylor Swift,” whom he still left unnamed.

The source told Freedman, per the affidavit, that Swift’s lawyer was called by Lively’s lawyer, who allegedly “requested, on Ms. Lively’s behalf, that Taylor Swift make a social media statement in support of Ms. Lively given her absence from the Super Bowl that year, and stated that if Ms. Swift failed to do so, Ms. Lively would release ’10 years’ of private texts with Ms. Swift.”

The person also claimed that Lively asked Swift to delete their past text messages “four or five months” prior, per the affidavit.

Freedman added that he was put in touch with the unnamed source via a “mutual friend who informed me that the individual wanted to talk,” and they’ve had “several phone calls” since.

It came to light on Friday, May 9, that Swift was issued a subpoena in the ongoing legal battle, which began when Lively sued her It Ends with Us costar and director, alleging sexual harassment and retaliation. Baldoni, 41, denied the claims, filing a $400 million countersuit of his own, accusing Lively and others of defamation and extortion.

In a fiery statement after the subpoena news, Swift’s spokesperson distanced the pop star from It Ends with Us and the surrounding legal drama, saying in part that Swift “never set foot on the set of this movie, she was not involved in any casting or creative decisions, she did not score the film, she never saw an edit or made any notes on the film.”

After pushback from Lively and her husband Ryan Reynolds on a subpoena issued to Venable, the law firm that represents Swift, Baldoni’s lawyers responded in their letter to the judge on Wednesday, arguing why they believe the subpoena is necessary in this case.

“The Lively Defendants’ insistence that the Subpoena seeks irrelevant information is wrong,” Freedman wrote in the letter.