Isaiah Lee, the person who came onto the stage and attacked Dave Chappelle , is taking legal action against the venue and its security, claiming to be bisexual and saying he got upset by the discriminatory jokes, rushing the stage as the show ended. He says he was
beaten ruthlessly by security who also spat on him and dislocated his arm. Lee further alleges that members of Chappelle’s group, encouraged by the comedian, also beat him with no intervention from security.
He also claims that the venue was aware of the offensive nature of some of Chappelle’s jokes but did not take any steps to prevent or lessen the potential harm caused by such material.
Lee is not filing a lawsuit against Chappelle himself.
After the attack, Chappelle continued his performance and even made jokes about it. The incident happened during the Netflix is a Joke Festival in Los Angeles. Video from KABC helicopter later showed Lee being taken away by medical staff on a gurney. Lee, who had a makeshift knife resembling a gun, was later arrested for suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon. Some time after the incident, Chappelle defended jokes about transgender people in his Netflix special “What’s in a Name?”. He explained, “The more you say I can’t say something, the more urgent it is for me to say it. And it has nothing to do with what you’re saying I can’t say. It has everything to do with my right, my freedom, of artistic expression. That is valuable to me.”
The comedian is not mentioned in the lawsuit
