Former Miami Dolphins player Xavien Howard accused of sharing revenge porn: court documents
FORT LAUDERDALE - Former Miami Dolphins cornerback Xavien Howard is being sued for sexual misconduct after one ex-girlfriend and the son of a second ex-girlfriend claimed that the NFL player publicly shared "sexually explicit material" of the two women and others without their consent.
According to court documents provided to CBS News Miami on Thursday, the two plaintiffs — identified only as Jane and John Doe — alleged that Howard publicly circulated photos and videos of the two women and others having sex with the NFL free agent to humiliate them and cause emotional distress.
CBS News Miami has reached out to Howard and the Miami Dolphins about the allegations. Neither party has responded at this time.
The case against Xavien Howard
According to court documents, Howard and Jane Doe used to be in a sexual relationship; however, once she refused his advances, the former Miami Dolphin then publicly circulated sexually explicit videos of her without consent, leaving her "debased and utterly humiliated."
Meanwhile, John Doe is the son of another woman who Howard was sexually involved with; after getting the woman pregnant, Howard allegedly demanded her to get an abortion and after her refusal, he went on a "warpath" against her. Among other "forms of revenge" toward the pregnant woman, Howard texted sexually explicit material of her to John Doe, who was underage at the time of the incident, causing emotional distress to him and his mom, court documents stated.
As victims, the plaintiffs seek to hold Howard responsible for his actions. If convicted, he could be charged with invasion of privacy by public disclosure of private facts, intentional infliction of emotional distress, injunctive relief, intrusion of privacy, and sexual cyberharassment.
Jane Doe
The first plaintiff, named as Jane Doe, was first contacted by Howard in 2016 after he began messaging her over Instagram. At the beginning of 2022, the two began dating before calling it quits in July of that year. During the course of the relationship, Jane and Howard "engaged in sexual relations," the court documents alleged.
Around Sept. 25, 2022, Jane Doe then received an Instagram message from another woman who claimed she had "several sexually explicit videos" that Howard sent her of him having sex with various women, informing Jane Doe that she might've been among them and that the other woman shared the videos with a third woman, too. Jane then asked the woman for her number and asked her to send the videos so she could see them, which she did on that day.
According to the court documents, the multiple texts showed the videos that Howard allegedly shared, which included two videos of Jane Doe having sex with Howard, and the rest of the videos showing other women.
After receiving and seeing the videos, she contacted Howard to find out why he shared them. Howard then said that he shared the videos to "make her mad because she did not want to have sex with him," the court documents alleged. It is unknown to Jane Doe whether the videos were shared with anyone else or posted to social media, but the plaintiff believes that that was the case.
According to the court documents, Howard had recorded having sex with Jane Doe with her knowledge on one occasion; however, he then nonconsensually shared the video with a second woman.
Around Oct. 7, 2022, Jane's attorney sent a cease-and-desist letter to Howard and then on Feb. 8, 2023, he attempted to call her, but she did not answer.
Then around April 10, 2023, Jane Doe was contacted again by another woman by cellphone, who sent her "several other sexually explicit photographs and videos" of naked women that Howard had recently shared, once again to "make her mad because she would not have sex with him," the court documents alleged. Jane Doe was also shown in one of the nude photos.
Around Aug. 21, 2023, Howard then filed a motion to dismiss the case on grounds that Jane Doe had a felony arrest record, the court documents alleged. Around Jan. 29, the court denied Howard's motion.
John Doe
Meanwhile, Howard had received the cellphone numbers of another woman's children, including the woman's son named in the lawsuit as John Doe, because "she would text him through her kids' phones if her own phone battery died."
She would often announce to Howard via voice or text that her phone had died and that she was using one of her children's phones to talk to him, and that she would tell him when to stop using her kids numbers' when she was able to return to using her own phone. Before returning to her own phone, the mother would delete the texts between her and Howard on her kids' phones. As a result, Howard knew John Doe's number, the court documents alleged.
On one occasion when Howard and John Doe's mother were fighting, he texted "sexually explicit material" of the woman to her son around Sept. 19, 2022. According to the court documents, the son was a minor when this happened.
Although the mother deleted the content from her son's phone, John Doe was able to see it when he logged into his iCloud account when he signed in from a friend's phone after he was grounded from using his own, the court documents alleged.
Howard's NFL career
Howard spent eight seasons with the Miami Dolphins, being drafted in the second round of the 2016 NFL Draft. During his tenure on the team, he was a four-time Pro Bowler, a two-time All-Pro member, and led the league in interceptions twice.
Miami released Howard in February, who still had three years remaining on his five-year, $90 million contract.
Off the field, he was sued in 2022 for allegedly giving a woman a sexually transmitted disease, according to the The Miami Herald.