Business, Legal Drama

Dencia v Liz Garvy, the ‘Girl Fight’ Continues with Garvy Tell All Statement – #Defamation?

I made it unequivocally clear I did not want this week to be a Dencia week. But, some legal drama when they start just do not know how to go away.It is a Brooke Valentine ‘Girl Fight’ all over again.

Now on to the legal issues raised.

1. Liz Garvy releases a statement about her relationship with Dencia and the reason for the fight. Was this necessary? If this is an attempted assassination of character, I am unsure it actually has worked. Dencia has, smartly, kept quiet in all the brouhaha. So who looks bad now? Garvy, a fashion industry professional causes me some consternation. You have to wonder, if people do business with Garvy and it goes really bad, should they expect to log online and see all their business all out like that? I’d be afraid to do business with someone like this. Dencia might very well be all of these horrible things claimed. But, the point is, Garvy is an adult, a business woman, her relationship did not go well with Dencia, keep it moving.

If it is that bad i.e. she claims Dencia sent harassing texts messages, taunted and teased her, then there is a remedy. When next she is in the USA, since she has a USA (visa), walk into a small claims or superior court here in California and sue. Further, either way you look at it, based on reported eye witness accounting, Garvy was the aggressor who struck Dencia. So, what exactly is the long story below for?

As harsh as this may sound, Garvy should learn to make better choices with who she surrounds herself with and does business with. Many times, even when you do your due diligence, people are who they are. That’s life. You find a more mature way to deal with the problem and keep it moving. You can sue, you can file a statement through the better business bureau about that person/business, if she is indeed defrauding etc., you can file a complaint with the police and push the prosecutor’s office here in the USA to prosecute, you can file in the UK (based on facts below) and the options are limitless.

I have never understood instances when professionals or industry folk have issues, especially African professional industry people, they just put the details out like that on a web portal that remains archived, indefinitely. It is one thing for press to create news about you and run with it. It is another thing to just go hand the drama to the press and the public. Can somebody say PR 101?

Other legal issues

1. Defamation-Whether within Nigeria or US laws, if what Garvy claims is untrue, Dencia can certainly sue her for Defamation. Obviously the more effective place to sue is in the USA. If Dencia were to sue, when next Garvy shows up, Dencia would be required to give Garvy notice about the lawsuit against her. This can be done via a process server or even a sheriff (depending on which court she sues in), forcing Garvy to come into US courts to defend herself.

2. “Alleged Claim of a Warrant for Garvy’s arrest.” – See the statement below. Garvy claims Dencia says she has a warrant for Garvy’s arrest. This is total nonsense. A judge issues out a bench warrant for an arrest. An individual cannot have a warrant out for another person’s arrest. A court will issue such warrant where there is a failure to appear in court for a hearing or where trial lawyers like myself issue out a subpoena commanding a witness to show up and they fail to, then a warrant can also be issued out.

If you receive subpoenas from a court or lawyer, obey and show up. If you have a court hearing, show up. Basically anything to do with the legal justice system, you are usually better off if you obey.

Ladies get this mess together. Contain the leak. You both should know better and quit with the nonsense. Garvy, Dencia can claim to be Nigerian all she wants. And so? She doesn’t like being Cameroonian, for whatever reason, she wants to be Nigerian, isn’t that her issue? If there are repercussions, particularly from her Nigerian fans, it is only a matter of time that she will get it. Focus on your business of fashion and please keep it moving. Awon agbaya’n ja kakiri . . . sheesh! No money attached to the fight sef. Sheesh!

____________________________________

1960 Chick culled the alleged statement by Garvy below:

“I met Reprudencia on facebook back in 2008, she was the one who contacted me requesting to be my friend and I considered adding her because we shared common friends. She further introduced herself as a fashionista and expressed her willingness to help me get bargains from US stores — to which I was receptive initially. However, I figured that it would be better, instead, that I travel to the US and have her take me around to the various stores for her purported bargains. Then in september 2010, I was ready to open my Ikoyi and Surulere outlets and decided to take a trip to the UK and US to stock-up the new stores.

While in the UK, during a chat with Reprudencia, she started trying to sell me some skin whitening injections and pills, and claimed to be an agent for plastic surgeons incase I wanted to undergo a surgical procedure to help me shed my body “FAT”. I told her I wasnt interested in bleaching my skin (incidentally, it’s evident she is bleaching her own skin, has silicon/fake boobs, and has undergone a nose-job), but the friend I was staying with (Joy) said she was interested and I passed the phone for them to talk and they both agreed to do business.The next day Joy sent $2000 to Reprudencia and was assured that the package would be ready by the time I arrived Los Angeles.

Upon my arrival in L.A, I contacted Reprudencia to inform her I was lodged in a hotel in town and was ready to be taken to the stores she’d mentioned earlier for the bargains. Little did I know that I was setting myself up to be duped. She insisted that I come stay over at her new apartment to which I obliged. She also asked that I please loan her some money to help purchase some things for her new apartment, to which I also obliged. Immediately I moved in with her she introduced me to a website, purportedly belonging to her friend, who sold trendy sunglasses and persuaded me to purchase her friend’s wares, to which I [again] obliged. After a week of staying with her I realized everything she had told me on facebook and via blackberry were all lies; she had no car,no house,absolutely nothing and no job. I rented the car she drove around,I paid for the bed i slept on, infact I paid for everything from groceries to the clothes she picked while I was shopping for my business.

Shortly afterwards, my friend Blossom who was based in Montreal, Canada came over to L.A to join me as we had earlier planned to meet in L.A. Reprudencia kept making excuses upon excuses on why Joy’s package was yet to arrive and had no forthcoming response when asked about the sunshades I’d ordered from her friend. She later introduced Blossom and I to a plastic surgeon friend who tried to talk us into undergoing an $18k worth liposuction surgical procedure to which we flatly declined — only to later find out that she was trying to lure us into paying for a free plastic surgery procedure for herself based on an agreement she has with the surgeon due to her being his ‘AGENT’. She even tried talking me into getting a fake social security card in order to get an American credit card to which I also declined because I already had an internationally accepted credit card from Nigeria. She went as far as stealing my card and going on a shopping spree without my knowledge to which I reported to my bank about her fraudulent transactions. She kept lying and making excuses about Joy’s package, claiming the company she ordered the injections from had delivered the package while we were out and therefore took it back. In response, I asked to see proof of the order, e.g an online receipt or a creditcard statement that shows the transaction, at that point she realized i had caught on so she sent an email from her laptop to the fictitious company, and then replied herself via her blackberry. She seemed to have forgotten that her blackberry had a signature — at the end of the so-called reply sent by the company, there was her name and an indication that it was sent from her bb. It was all a SCAM. It then dawned on me she never ordered or paid for any skin whitening injections or pills for Joy to begin with furthermore I realised that she had gone to her friend who owned the website I ordered the Sunglasses to collect the payment I made for the Sunglasses.

By then I’d had enough and confronted her about her scams and dubious schemes, expectedly she denied any wrongdoing and flared-up. She even threatened to call the police to throw me out. It took the efforts of friends who witnessed the confrontation to calm her down. Consequently, I called a cab and left her apartment for a hotel. She left her apartment before the cab arrived. I waited at the hotel for a whole week to see if the injections she claimed to have ordered for Joy would indeed arrive, to no avail and I lost money for the Sunshades to her as well.

At that point, Joy was understandably very upset and was holding me responsible for everything because I introduced her to Reprun..whatever

When she got home and realized Blossom and I had left, she started accusing me of stealing her shoe and clothes,that sounded ridiculous because:

1. She is a size uk 4 while Blossom and I are size 12′s.

2. Was I going to sell used clothes in my shops?

3. The shoe she claimed I stole is a Gianmarco Lorenzi immitation/fake she bought for $130 ,I sell these shoes.

4. She had told me her sister siezed her passport cause she was ‘traveling too much instead of going to school’…she must have been lying so I wouldn’t know all the so called trips she claimed to have made were untrue. Only for her to send me a mail 3 months later claiming she couldnt find her passport and she was sure I must have taken it. Reprun..whatever is a full blooded cameroonian citizen on a USA student visa (though she claims to be ‘half-Nigerian’), so what on earth would I want to do with a Cameroonian passport? I dont speak french and I dont want to live in Cameroon( I am PROUDLY NIGERIAN), I have a multiple USA visa so I couldnt get my head around the accusation.

Repru-whatever IS LIVING A CHAMPAGNE LIFE ON A PALMWINE INCOME and projecting a false impression that life is greener on the other side on FACEBOOK. Early this year I reported her to the police which I also have a proof for.

I have documented proof of her scams; E-mail exchanges and chats between her and I, Police report, as well as proof that she swindled an Italian friend last year.

She claims to have a warrant for my arrest; I have been going to and fro the USA for several months now (most recently 2-months ago) and have not been harrassed even once on account of any so-called warrant. She also claims to have video evidence of my theft of her things while in her apartment, I am now challenging her to produce the so-called evidence or forever hold her peace.

I own three shops in Lagos (VGC, IKOYI, and SURULERE). I have no partners, so I wonder how on earth I would even remotely consider stealing from a fake, wanna-be celebrity, attention seeking tramp like Repru-whatever . She is greedy, dubious and desperate,as the following video further proves:

All of the aformentioned culminated in the incident that occured at the just concluded HEADIES 2011 awards. Upon her arrival in Nigeria for the awards event, Repru-whatever started sending me threatening text messages and challenging me to do my worst inspite of all she did to me. I guess the she has seen a slight taste of that.”

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Credited for several firsts in the fashion and entertainment industry, Uduak Oduok (Ms. Uduak) is a fashion and entertainment lawyer, speaker, visionary, gamechanger, trailblazer, and recognized thought leader, for her work on Africa’s emerging global fashion and entertainment markets, and the niche practice of fashion law in the United States. She is also the founder of ‘Africa Music Law,’ an industry go-to music business and law blog and podcast show empowering African artists. Her work in the creative and legal industries has earned her numerous awards and recognitions, including an award from the American University Washington College of Law for her “legal impact in the field of intellectual property in Africa." She has also taught as an Adjunct Professor at several institutions in the United States. For more information, visit her at https://msuduak.com.

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