By Laurence Darmiento
Publication Date: 2026-03-06 11:00:00
A lawsuit filed by a former girlfriend and business partner of tech billionaire Eric Schmidt accusing him of sexual assault was sent to arbitration this week by a Los Angeles judge.
Michelle Ritter, 32, of Los Angeles, alleged that a 2022 federal law inspired by the #MeToo movement intended to end forced arbitration of sexual assault and harassment claims allowed her to have her case heard in open court.
Superior Court Judge Michael Small disagreed, ruling that the law did not apply because a financial settlement and arbitration agreement Ritter and Schmidt signed in December 2024 was entered into after the alleged sexual wrongdoing — not before as legally required.
Ritter filed a lawsuit in November that alleged Schmidt, a former chief executive and chairman of Google, “forcibly raped” her while on a yacht off the coast of Mexico in 2021. She also claimed they had sex without her consent during the 2023 Burning Man festival in Nevada.
She further alleged that Schmidt had …