AZA Client Victimized by Viral, False Rumor Featured in Major National Media,  Including NY Times and NBC 

HOUSTON – AZA client Mary Kate Cornett, a typical Ole Miss freshman, saw her life turned upside down in the worst conceivable way when vicious, false rumors about her were spread on social media and then amplified by sports media personalities, including ESPN’s Pat McAfee. 

The young Houston woman’s terrifying story first spread in late February as a defamatory false rumor about her alleged sex life. Now, the truth told by Ms. Cornett, her father and her lawyers at AZA has been featured in major media around the globe.  

“Five weeks ago, she was a first-year business major dating another Ole Miss student. Happy. Confident. Outgoing. Then her idyllic freshman experience was pierced on Feb. 25 when a spurious claim about her and her boyfriend’s father spread on YikYak, an anonymous message-based app popular among college students. It then gained traction on X and collided with the sports talk ecosystem to become a top trending topic that day. Many posts featured a picture of Cornett pulled from her Instagram account.,” wrote Katie Strang of The Athletic, which is owned by The New York Times, in “ESPN’s Pat McAfee and others amplified a false rumor. A teenager’s life was ‘destroyed’” (subscription required). 

“I would like people to be held accountable for what they’ve done,” Ms. Cornett told The Athletic. “You’re ruining my life by talking about it on your show for nothing but attention, but here I am staying up until 5 in the morning, every night, throwing up, not eating because I’m so anxious about what’s going to happen for the rest of my life.” 

She was showered with negative, vile phone calls and texts; her mother’s home was the scene of a SWAT raid; she had to move out of her dorm room and start talking classes online.   

“Having your life ruined by people who have no idea who you are is the worst feeling in the world,” Ms. Cornett said, while tearing up. “It makes you feel so alone. It’s a horrible experience,” she told NBC anchor Tom Llamas in national TV news segments. 

Ms. Cornett’s father, Justin, explained the nightmare well. “The only way I could describe it is it’s like you’re walking with your daughter on the street, holding her hand, and a car mirror snags her shirt and starts dragging her down the road. And all you can do is watch,” Mr. Cornett said to The Athletic. “You can’t catch the car. You can’t stop it from happening. You just have to sit there and watch your kid be destroyed.” 

The Athletic sports media columnist Andrew Marchand wrote in  “From Don Imus to Pat McAfee, talk show hosts face consequences of the digital world: Marchand”  that “Defenders of (Don) Imus back in the day, or McAfee now, might say the hosts were just joking around, it’s just comedy or that McAfee’s use of the word ‘allegedly’ takes him off the hook. For McAfee’s diehard audience, this may be justification enough. But when you read what Cornett has been through, how her life was irrevocably changed by an untrue rumor, however you look at what McAfee said, he poured gas on a fire.” 

The Cornetts engaged AZA’s Monica Uddin, Michael  Killingsworth and John Zavitsanos. Ms. Uddin, who appeared on NBC with the young woman, said she believes what happened to her client is cyberbullying and grounds for a defamation case.  

“Defamation has existed for a long time. You can’t lie about someone with impunity — and that’s what has happened to Mary Kate,” Ms. Uddin said. “You can’t lie for money.”  

“Not using her name is not a ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ card, saying ‘allegedly’ is not a ‘Get Out of Jail Free’ card,” Ms. Uddin added. “These people are responsible for what they have done to her.” 

AZA is now conducting an investigation to hold accountable all those who are responsible.  

AZA, or Ahmad, Zavitsanos & Mensing, is a Houston-based law firm that is home to true courtroom lawyers with a formidable track record in complex commercial litigation, including energy, healthcare, intellectual property and business dispute cases. AZA is recognized by Chambers USA 2024 as among the best in Texas in commercial law and intellectual property; has been listed by Best Lawyers’ Best Law Firms as one of the country’s best commercial litigation firms for 13 years; has been named Litigation Department of the Year by Texas Lawyer three times; and was previously dubbed a Texas Powerhouse law firm by Law360.