Judge Rejects Bid to Dismiss WWE Ring Boys Abuse Lawsuit

A federal judge on Monday, October 19 denied a motion by WWE, TKO Group Holdings, Vince McMahon and Linda McMahon to have a lawsuit alleging childhood sexual abuse thrown out, allowing the case to move forward.

The suit was originally filed in 2024 by eight anonymous plaintiffs who say they were sexually abused as children in the 1980s and 1990s while working as so-called “ring boys” — young workers who helped set up rings, ran errands and performed other tasks around WWE events during that era. The plaintiffs have proceeded under pseudonyms given the sensitive nature of the allegations.

With the dismissal bid rejected, the litigation is now set to continue, putting WWE’s current parent company TKO, along with Vince and Linda McMahon personally, back in the legal crosshairs over conduct alleged to have occurred decades before the company’s merger with UFC created TKO in 2023.

This case is one of several legal and reputational issues that have trailed Vince McMahon in recent years. He stepped down from WWE’s then-parent company WWE Inc. in 2024 amid a separate federal lawsuit from a former employee alleging sexual assault and trafficking, a suit that was ultimately settled. He had returned to a leadership role at TKO following his 2022 resignation over a previous scandal involving hush-money payments, only to exit again once the trafficking allegations surfaced. Linda McMahon, meanwhile, has largely stepped away from day-to-day involvement with the company in recent years, though she remains a named defendant here given her historical role as a WWE executive.

The ring boys case is notable both for its subject matter — allegations stretching back to the Hulkamania era of WWE’s history — and for the fact that it names TKO itself, a company that didn’t exist when the alleged abuse took place but which absorbed WWE’s assets and, evidently, some of its legal exposure. Whether TKO’s ownership structure insulates it from liability tied to decades-old conduct, or whether the courts view it as inheriting those obligations along with WWE’s business, is likely to be a central legal question as the case proceeds.

For WWE, now operating under the stewardship of Nick Khan and with Triple H running creative, the lawsuit is an unwelcome reminder that the promotion’s past continues to resurface even as it enjoys a run of record business success tied to its partnership with Netflix and a broader mainstream push. The denial of the dismissal motion means depositions, discovery and potentially a trial could lie ahead, keeping the allegations — and the McMahons’ names — in the headlines for the foreseeable future.

No trial date has been set, and it remains to be seen how WWE and the McMahons will respond to the ruling. PW Exclusive will continue to follow developments in the case.