Bobby Brown started the weekend with gratifying news on Friday, when a Georgia judge ruled that Bobbi Kristina Brown’s boyfriend, Nick Gordon, was legally responsible for her death last year.
Brown told People that he’s “pleased” with the outcome, adding that he now needs “to process all the emotions.”
“I am pleased with the outcome of today’s court proceedings,” Brown said. “All I ever wanted was answers relating to who and what caused my daughter’s death. Today’s judgment tells me it was Nick Gordon. Now I need to process all the emotions I have and lean on God to get me and my family through this.”
The ruling came after Gordon failed to appear in court for a wrongful death lawsuit brought against him by Brown’s court-appointed conservator, Bedelia Hargrove.
“The court finds Nicholas Gordon in contempt of its March 25, 2016 order,” the ruling issued Friday by Fulton Court Superior Court Judge T. Jackson Bedford Jr. reads. “All of Nicholas Gordon’s pleadings are struck and judgment by default is hereby ordered against Nicholas Gordon.”
The multimillion-dollar suit filed last year claims that Gordon accused Brown — the daughter of Whitney Houston and Bobby Brown — of being unfaithful and “gave Bobbi Kristina a toxic cocktail rendering her unconscious and then put her face down in a tub of cold water.”
Brown died July 26, 2015 at a hospice in Georgia, after clinging to life for six months. She was 22. In January of that year, she was found face-down and unresponsive in the bathtub of her Georgia home.
In addition to the wrongful death claim, the suit also alleges assault, battery, intentional infliction of emotional distress and transferring money without authorization.
On Friday, the judge, T. Jackson Bedford, deemed that, since Gordon had twice failed to show up at court, Hargrove’s accusations have been admitted through omission.
Gordon’s attorneys denied the allegations in Hargrove’s complaint, stating, “The recent lawsuit against Nick is slanderous and meritless. Nick has been heartbroken and destroyed over the loss of his love and it’s shameful that such baseless allegations have been presented publicly. Nick has engaged civil counsel and intends to defend the lawsuit vigorously and expose it for what it is: a fictitious assault against the person who loved Krissy most.”