Even though the Area 51 festival in Rachel, NV happened a month ago, we’re still learning more about the unintentional fallout from this real-life meme event. According to an exclusive report from 13 Investigates, Connie West, owner of the Little A’Le’Inn in Rachel, filed a lawsuit with Alienstock owner Matty Roberts and his business partner Frank DiMaggio just days after the event.
Under dispute are a litany of issues including trademark infringement, breach of contract, intentional interference, business disparagement, and defamation.
Roberts and DiMaggio released a joint statement on September 10 announcing they were “officially disconnecting” their support and the Alienstock brand from West’s event, which Roberts and DiMaggio had left her to produce under her insistence that she was capable of doing so.
“We will no longer offer our logo, social media, website or Matty Roberts likeness or scheduled appearance,” part of the statement read. “In short, the relationship has ended permanently, and AlienStock will be moving to a safe, clean secure area in Downtown Las Vegas as an alternative.”
Many media publications, Your EDM included, took this to mean AlienStock, at least in its original form, whether correctly or not, had been cancelled.
“We never told them anything was canceled out there, we just said the Alienstock brand and Matty Roberts would not be there,” explained DiMaggio during a Sept. 23 interview with 13 Investigates. The official Alienstock event eventually moved to the Downtown Las Vegas Events Center.
“It changed [the event] 100%, their campaign started at 6:45 a.m. in the Morning Show against me,” explained West about the less-than-expected turn out.
Writes 13, “Also in dispute is a $70,000 PornHub sponsorship that West claims was supposed to pay for event-related expenses such as security, medical, and portable toilets.
“Her lawsuit alleges Roberts and his associates unjustly kept the money and did not hold up their end of the deal.”
“A lot of what she’s saying is not accurate and there’s many witnesses that will corroborate, she’s not a victim in this,” said DiMaggio.
West also claimed that various people would call the Little A’Le’Inn and threaten violence against her and her employees. “I had people call my business and say they were a sniper and they have their sights on us, ‘Don’t turn around,’ things like that,” explained West.
According to 13, Roberts and his associates have to file an answer to the allegations in court by the end of month.