[Warning: Potentially Triggering Content]
A contestant from Love Is Blind is suing after her horrific experience on the show.
According to People on Friday, Tran Dang was a cast member on season five of the Netflix reality show and got engaged — although she was not featured in the episodes. Now, she is alleging sexual assault, false imprisonment, and negligence in a lawsuit against the production companies Kinetic Content and Delirium TV. Prepare yourselves, Love Is Blind fans, because there are some disturbing details in this case…
In the complaint, Dang claimed she “did not seek involvement” and was “aggressively recruited” by Kinetic’s casting team to join the season five cast in Houston. She eventually agreed to participate in the dating experiment. Once Dang entered the pods, though, she alleged it was absolute hell.
Related: Love Is Blind Producers Clap Back At ‘Emotional Warfare’ & Mistreatment Claims!
While filming the show, the lawsuit claims the cast was completely cut off from the outside world inside the pods. They allegedly were “intentionally sequestered for two weeks” with no cell phones, passports, wallets, or communication devices. Instead, Dang said the cast members were given little food and lots of alcohol in order “to encourage them to engage in striking conversations and actions that would increase viewer ratings.” She further alleged they had to ask permission to do anything, including using the bathroom:
“While on set, for up to 18 hours per day, [Kinetic Content and Delirium TV] required Ms. Dang to request permission to do virtually anything, including use the restroom. She was prohibited from leaving her hotel room without express permission and kept under 24-hour surveillance.”
However, show creator Chris Coelen insisted the accusations are “absolutely false” and “defamatory.” He told People:
“We don’t push alcohol. Everyone has consistent and regular access to food and water.”
When it comes to the bathroom, Coelen said the contestants are only told to ask first while they are in the pods due to the confusing layout of the set and not to ruin the experiment:
“In the pods, they’re on a 68,000-square-foot sound stage, where it’s dark, there’s a lot of people, there’s a lot of equipment, and even for me, it’s very confusing to get around from place to place. Because of that, and because we want to protect the integrity of the experiment, we do not want them wandering around by themselves, and wandering over into [the other sex’s] living quarters, because sometimes people are tempted to do that — we want to avoid that.”
He added:
“So if they need to go to the bathroom, they tell us and we have someone escort them to the bathroom. That is how it works in the pods. When they are out of the pods, they can go to the bathroom whenever they want.”
But that was only the beginning of the nightmare for Dang…
During the show, she got engaged to fellow contestant Thomas Smith before going to Mexico with the rest of the cast. While on the couple’s vacation, Dang claims she was sexually assaulted by her former fiancé on May 3, 2022:
“Smith, and without Ms. Dang’s consent, forcefully groped her, exposed himself in the nude, and repeatedly made sexual contact over her express objections.”
And given that production has “24-hour surveillance of cast members,” the “traumatic acts” she experienced “were likely captured on film.” So awful…
The lawsuit stated Dang “was baffled that no one had intervened to stop the harassment” and reported the incident. However, an assistant producer allegedly “gaslighted her, implying that she was at fault for what had happened with Thomas Smith by not communicating effectively or somehow not taking the ‘relationship’ seriously.”
WTF?!
And that wasn’t the only incident with Smith. When the pair returned to Houston, Dang claimed he harassed her on a phone call on May 14. This alleged situation led him to reach out to producers, “complaining that she had reported his behavior.” During that time, she also alleged she was not allowed to go anywhere and “her movements were continuously monitored by a ‘wrangler.’”
After allegedly trying several times to tell producers about what happened, Dang ended up quitting. Before leaving, she was told she must film a “final scene,” in which producers gave her lines to say.
Coelen shut down Dang’s accusations, first saying production does not film all day. As for the sexual assault allegations? He claims she “never told” production “that she felt unsafe or experienced any of the allegations that she made”:
“She did not make any kind of claim of assault of any kind. We would not continue filming with someone who was expressing that an incident of that sort had happened. We have round-the-clock psychologists, a highly trained production team, we have a whole battalion of people who’s job it is to make sure that we prioritize our participant’s well-being. But the participant has to be actively involved in that process.”
He continued:
“Claiming that you are falsely imprisoned on Love Is Blind is preposterous and ridiculous. You come and go as you choose. You are not required to stay. If you stay, that is your decision. The participants are not under our control. They are living their lives. We come in, we film them for a period of time, we leave. They can leave — as many, many, many people have before — anytime they want.”
Coelen then stressed that production does not film “around the clock,” adding:
“We are not mounting cameras in their personal living spaces. We don’t do that. We’re like a documentary. They are alone during periods of times, they are not under surveillance. We do not tell people what to say, what to do, we consistently tell people that this is their journey, this is their life to lead as they choose. We’re there to follow it.”
At this time, Smith has not addressed her sexual assault claims. Kinetic Content and Delirium TV addressed the accusations, saying they are “meritless” in a statement to People:
“We support and stand with victims of sexual assault, but Ms. Dang’s claims against the producers are meritless. We document the independent choices of adults who volunteer to participate in a social experiment. Their journey is not scripted, nor is it filmed around the clock. We have no knowledge or control over what occurs in private living spaces when not filming, and participants may choose to end their journey at any time.”
They continued:
“We take any and all concerns of our participants seriously and prioritize their well-being. Obviously, we cannot address undisclosed concerns, and throughout the time that Ms. Dang was involved in the production of Love is Blind, she never informed the producers of any alleged wrongdoing of any kind. Nor did she choose to end her participation in the experiment. Instead, Ms. Dang continued in the experiment for weeks after the time her lawyers now claim an incident occurred. We deny and will vigorously defend the allegations against us.”
Of course, this is not the first time we’ve heard about alleged mistreatment on the set of this show. Former contestants and couple Danielle Ruhl and Nick Thompson have been very vocal about their negative experience on Love Is Blind.
Thoughts, Perezcious readers?
If you or someone you know has experienced sexual violence and would like to learn more about resources, consider checking out https://www.rainn.org/resources.
[Image via Love Is Blind/Netflix/YouTube]