Luke Combs Defends Florida Fan After Winning Lawsuit
On Wednesday morning, Luke Combs expressed his dismay upon discovering he had been awarded a judgment of $250,000 against a woman from Florida who had made a whopping $380 by selling 18 customized tumblers featuring his likeness.
The famous country singer declared that he had been entirely uninformed of the legal proceedings brought against him, or the decision made in an Illinois court until his attention was brought to the woman weeping in a television news broadcast.
Combs appears to have been completely unaware of the lawsuit for $250,000 that has been filed concerning the tumblers, and expressed dismay upon finding out the plaintiff was going through financial hardship.
The country music star’s team initiated legal action against the woman, although Combs affirmed in a video posted on December 14th that he was not aware of the lawsuit until he woke up and read the news.
Luke Combs reported that he called Nicol Harness, the defendant in the lawsuit, and promised to transfer $11,000 to meet her immediate needs – twice the amount of $5,500 that she claimed was held in her Amazon store account, as now all her profits are designated to be used to pay the $250,000 the judge ordered her to be responsible for to Combs.
The singer declared that he intends to offer his tumbler through his merch store, with all the money from the product going toward covering Harness’ medical expenses.
A legal action was instituted in an Illinois federal court against Nicol Harness, an admirer of Luke Combs, over her purported sale of $20 Luke Combs tumblers on Amazon for a total of $380. This fan had come up with the idea of selling the tumblers after attending one of Combs’ performances earlier this year.
Talking about the incident on Instagram, Combs shared a video stating,
“We do have a company that goes after folks — only, supposedly, large corporations operating internationally that make millions and millions of dollars — making counterfeit T-shirts, things of that nature, running illegal businesses.”
He further added that he was sickened to learn about Nicol’s involvement in the case.
“And apparently this woman, Nicol, has somehow gotten wrapped into that, and that makes me absolutely sick to my stomach.”
Luke Combs ended the video by assuring his fans that he is not that “kind of person”.
“I wanted to clear that up, man, because it makes me sick for anybody to be thinking that I’m this kind of person, because I’m the farthest thing from it. So, love you guys and I’ll keep you posted.”
Nicol Harness Tells Her Story
Harness was shocked to find out about the suit when she got the notification of the fine of $250,000 following her discharge from the hospital for congestive heart failure.
This piece of news from WFLA in Tampa had Combs’ attention. Harness tearfully revealed that she had not been aware of the lawsuit as the notification had gone into a rarely checked AOL spam folder.
During an interview with WFLA, Nicol expressed that the situation was very stressful for her and she meant no harm to the singer.
“It’s very stressful. I don’t have money to pay my bills. I just want this resolved. I didn’t mean any harm to Luke Combs. I quit selling the tumbler. I pulled it down. I just don’t understand.”
She shared that her main source of income is from selling goods on Amazon, but the corporation stopped her from accessing the funds after the ruling.
A fine of $250,000 was reportedly imposed on multiple counterfeit sellers, Harness included, as a punishment.
