DALLAS — A Washington, D.C., woman is claiming in a new lawsuit that Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones is her biological father, multiple news outlets are reporting.
According to The Dallas Morning News and ESPN, lawyers for congressional aide Alexandra Davis, 25, filed the lawsuit last week in Dallas County, Texas. The documents allege that she was conceived in the mid-1990s when Jones, now 79, and her mother, Cynthia Davis Spencer, were in a relationship, ESPN reported.
The lawsuit goes on to allege that when Davis was 1, Jones, who denied the paternity claim, agreed in a 1998 settlement to pay the mother and daughter $375,000 and set up financial trusts for the pair if they kept the allegation confidential, according to the Morning News.
The lawsuit says Davis, who was born in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1996 and was raised in northern Texas, wants to ensure that she can’t be sued or lose access to her trusts if she seeks to prove that Jones fathered her, the newspaper reported. She does not believe she should be legally bound to the settlement’s terms, the documents say.
The lawsuit was available on Dallas County’s website earlier this week before a judge sealed it Wednesday, the Morning News and ESPN reported. Both news organizations said they obtained copies of the documents.
Jones’ spokesman, Jim Wilkinson, and Davis’ attorney, Andrew Bergman, declined ESPN’s requests for a comment on the allegations.
Jones shares three children with his wife, Gene, whom he married in 1963, according to The Associated Press. He has owned the Cowboys since 1989.
Davis Spencer and Davis appeared in season three of the reality show “Big Rich Texas,” the Morning News reported.
– The Associated Press contributed to this report.