Judge orders ‘Love Is Blind’ cast member back to arbitration

LOS ANGELES (CN) — Former "Love is Blind" cast member Renee Poche will have to take her legal dispute with the show's production company back to arbitration, after a Superior Court judge on Friday denied Poche's request for a preliminary injunction and granted the company's motion to compel arbitration.

Poche was a 32-year-old veterinarian living in Texas when she was cast for the fifth season of "Love is Blind," a Netflix reality TV series in which contestants court each other in special purpose-built "pods," allowing them to blindly communicate.

Only after one proposes marriage are they allowed to lay eyes on one another. The prospective couple then travel to Mexico and visit their respective hometowns. Should the relationship make it through that punishing gauntlet, a wedding may result.

Poche, who was paid $8,000 to appear on the show, says she fell in love with Carter Wall, a 6-foot-5-inch, 30-year-old construction worker and former college football player whom Poche says turned out to be a homeless and violent drug addict.

"Wall regularly berated Poche, stole from the set or places they visited, and solicited others to buy painkillers and amphetamines for him," Poche said in her complaint. "On multiple nights, Wall did not go to sleep at all due to his abuse of amphetamines. Wall was emotionally abusive on and off camera, lied malignantly, and heavily abused drugs and alcohol."

In her complaint, filed in January, Poche claims she was pressured into continuing her TV romance with Wall and moving forward with the wedding. She did — although the budding marriage ended rather unhappily when she declined to say "I do."

Despite its obvious drama, Poche's storyline was mostly cut out of the series before it aired. That spurred Poche to give a series of interviews.

Those interviews — according to Netflix and the show's production company, Delirium — were a violation of the strict nondisclosure clause in Poche's contract, making her liable for up to $4 million. The contract also included an arbitration clause, sending all legal disputes to JAMS, the largest private arbitration and mediation service in the country.

Poche's lawyers on Friday asked the judge to issue a preliminary injunction blocking those arbitration proceedings. Meanwhile, Delirium asked the judge to issue an order compelling Poche into arbitration.

Bryan Freedman, Poche's attorney, argued that Poche's contract ostensibly waived her right to sue over anything, including injury or even death — a violation of the Fair Employment and Housing Act.

"There’s very rarely a release that covers everything that could happen to you," Freedman said. "She could be punched in the face [or] sexually assaulted."

"You can’t pre-release intentional torts," Freedman added. "That pre-release is a violation of FEHA."

From the outset, Superior Court Judge Bruce Iwasaki made it clear that he was going to side with Delirium and Netflix.

"The issue right now is the forum," said the judge. "You can argue that the release is overbroad [or] is against public policy. All of those things, you can raise to the arbitrator."

According to the contract, "the arbitrator decides arbitrability," the judge said. He added later: "The court is stuck with the contract. That’s the contract."

Another of Poche's lawyers, Jason Sunshine, argued that "the delegation clause is procedurally unconscionable" because it was "imposed by Delirium on a take-it-or-leave-it basis without counsel present."

He said that Poche didn't have the money to pay for arbitration fees, which are typically split between the two parties (although in this case, Delirium has said they're willing to cover the costs of arbitration). He also said that there were issues in the dispute that required discovery.

Judge Iwasaki was unmoved. "I’ve heard enough," he said. "Sit down."

"Are you ruling that the delegation clause is not unconscionable?" Sunshine asked.

"I find no evidence it is," said the judge.

Freedman begged the judge, three times, to take another look at one of the clauses in the contract, which he said amounted to a carve-out or exception to the arbitration clause.

"I don’t think I need to do that," said Iwasaki, losing patience. "There's no language in the agreement that creates a carve-out or exception. I don't accept that."

"You understand that Ms. Poche is being sued in arbitration?" said Freedman. "She made $8,000. She’s being sued for $4 million."

"To put her through that process and to not really look at what her rights are under the delegation clause is really unfair," Freedman added, before saying of the reality television industry: "It’s just a shame the way people are treated in this space."

After the hearing, Freedman said that his client will appeal the ruling and that he was confident it would be overturned.

"It doesn’t matter whether it’s in arbitration or the court of public opinion," Freedman said. "Holding someone responsible for $4 million when you pay them $8,000 for a show is disgusting. It doesn’t comport with any of our society’s norms."

"We're all trying to be better," Freedman added — but "reality TV isn’t trying to be better. They’re trying to get ratings."

In a written statement, Delirium's lawyers, Larry Iser and Allen Secretov, praised the ruling.

"Rather than defend against Delirium’s claims in arbitration," they wrote, "Ms. Poche and her lawyers chose to file a headline-grabbing complaint in court against Delirium and Netflix."

"Delirium did not want to litigate with Ms. Poche," they added. "Ms. Poche was asked to stop her unauthorized interviews and to promptly mediate the dispute." They said Delirium had repeatedly warned Poche about her breach of the agreement.

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