Christina Aguilera pleaded with a L.A. judge to keep the legal battle with her former business partner out of the public eye, In Touch can exclusively report.
According to court documents obtained by In Touch, Christina, 43, demanded the lawsuit brought by a businessman named John Herzog, and his company Herzog Holdings, and Xquistitely Frozen, LLC, to be moved to arbitration.
Christina argued that all the agreements signed between the parties explicitly stated any disputes would be heard before an arbitrator and NOT in public court. Further, Christina said John was “unable to deliver a viable product.”
Her lawyer said, “Although the Company was founded more than three years ago, [John and his company] have not yet developed a frozen dessert product. In an effort to try and shift blame for this failure, [John’s] Complaint makes a variety of allegations concerning alleged disputes among the three principal parties to the Operating Agreement about the operation and management of the Company.”
The judge has yet to rule on Christina’s request.
In his lawsuit, John and his company claimed to have spent months creating an ice cream brand for Christina, only for her and her team to back out at the last minute.
The other defendants in the lawsuit are Roc Nation, Roc’s executive, Laurence “Jay” Brown, and another Roc employee named Sarah Francus.
John’s lawsuit alleged breach of contract, intentional interference with contractual relations — and a claim of fraud against Jay and Roc Nation.
Christina signed with Jay-Z’s management company, Roc Nation, in 2020. In the suit, John said after Christina signed with Roc Nation, Jay Brown approached him about developing a product line for Christina.
John said he knew Jay from working on other projects. John said he wasn’t sold at first. He said Jay promised him Christina would be hard-working and that Roc Nation’s other clients would help with promotion of the product.
Eventually, the parties agreed on Christina developing a line of ice cream and frozen desserts. Christina and her team saw the deal being potentially as big as Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty.
The name of the brand was to be Xquistitely Frozen. In the suit, John claimed Jay liked the idea so much that he decided to create his own ice cream brand separate from Christina’s line.
John said he entered into a separate deal to help develop Jay’s line, Madison Brown. John said he was told by Jay that Jay would tell Christina about his ice cream line. John said he did not believe this happened.
In the suit, John claimed Jay lost interest in Christina’s line once his ice cream company was up and running.
He accused Jay of slowing down Christina’s deal to benefit his competing Madison Brown ice cream project. John said Jay and Roc Nation caused Christina to miss meetings and make unreasonable demands.
Eventually, he said the parties switched the idea from ice cream to paletas despite John claiming he spent a ton of money and time in developing the ice cream line. In the suit, John said Christina was a pleasure to work with. He quoted several text messages they exchanged during the process.
He said she texted him, “great things on the horizon!!” in October 2020 and “so happy today and for all the new exciting things that lie ahead” in December 2020. John said he relied on Christina’s messages when he continued to invest in the project.
After one meeting, he said Christina texted him, “Just wanted to tell you how great today was and how excited I am about our business together but also the friendship I feel. Your belief & support in me since day one has always meant so much. I always leave your company feeling joyful and inspired.”
John said he provided Christina and her family tickets to various sporting events and concerts as, “gestures meant to demonstrate friendship, as well as his commitment to fostering the kind of positive and supportive partnership so essential to the success of a good business relationship.”
After the parties switched from ice cream to paletas, John said Christina texted him a photo of a children’s book sold on Amazon entitled Paletero Man saying that her daughter’s class had “recently read it in school … a sign.”
John said he continued to work on the project for months. Things took a turn in March 2023, when he said Christina ghosted him after months of friendly texts and him providing her with expensive tickets to sporting events. In the suit, John said he never received a reason on why the deal fell apart.
He claimed Christina and Roc Nation stopped working on the deal and then moved the pop star on to selling lubricants and sex toys.
John’s lawsuit demands unspecified damages along with punitive damages.
