A prominent Black Lives Matter activist who tried to collect $10 million in a “frivolous” lawsuit against the national group last year may now be on the hook for more than $700,000 in legal fees and costs, The Post has learned.
Los Angeles-based activist Melina Abdullah has already been ordered to pay $100,698 in legal fees to Bowers Consulting, a firm run by Black Lives Matter Global Network Foundation leader Shalomyah Bowers, according to a decision this month by a Los Angeles Superior Court judge,
“Melina Abdullah sought a lawsuit of lies to try and gain power, and it didn’t work,” Bowers said in an exclusive statement to The Post Wednesday. “I am happy a judge resoundingly dismissed Melina’s lawsuit a few months ago, but it was also really important that there be some accountability for her actions because free speech does not allow you to propagate lies … We’re thankful the judge is holding her accountable.”
On Jan. 30, a judge will decide whether Abdullah and her breakaway Black Lives Matter Grassroots will be forced to pay more than $600,000 in additional legal fees and costs to BLMGNF and Bowers himself.
“BLMGNF agrees with the Court’s decision to dismiss the entire lawsuit,” said Byron McLain, the attorney for BLMGNF, in a statement to The Post Wednesday. “BLM Grassroots is required by statute to pay for BLMGNF’s attorneys’ fees and costs as a result, and we look forward to hearing the Judge’s decision on the exact amount BLM Grassroots and Melina Abdullah must reimburse to BLMGNF.”
Abdullah, a professor of Pan African Studies at California State University in Los Angeles, had accused Bowers of “siphoning” more than $10 million in fees from donors to pay his consulting firm, according to her 2022 lawsuit, which was dismissed last year. Abdullah incorporated BLM Grassroots in May 2022 after she was ousted from the national group, according to public records.
Abdullah had claimed that her group, which she said was comprised of two dozen BLM chapters across the country, was entitled to the cash, but Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Stephanie Bowick ruled in July that they failed to prove their case.
At the time, Bowers told The Post that the lawsuit was little more than a power grab after Abdullah had been denied a position on the governing board of the non-profit. Bowers took over BLMGNF following board unrest after the resignation of BLMGNF co-founder Patrisse Cullors, who left the organization after The Post revealed that she went on a $3 million real-estate buying spree.
Abdullah, who posted a 29-minute video on her site denouncing Bowers and other members of the BLMGNF board, refused comment when contacted by The Post Wednesday.
Cullors claimed she did not use any donations to purchase three properties in Los Angeles and Atlanta.
The group, which raked in more than $90 million in donations after the death of George Floyd in 2020, did spend donations to buy a $6 million, 6,500-square-foot mansion in Studio City that Cullors said was to be used as an office and event space for the non-profit. The group also spent $6.3 million in donor funds on a mansion in Toronto for the BLM Canadian chapter.
Abdullah was a co-founder of BLM along with Cullors and Alizia Garza. The three women were leading the non-profit when a shell company for the group purchased the Los Angeles property in Oct. 2020.
Abdullah, a defund-the-police supporter, has also sued the Los Angeles Police Department — for allegedly harassing her when they sent a SWAT team to her home in 2020 — as well as a former district attorney.