Ice Skating Champ Lost Profits, Sues Reps Starting At $1 Million

Ice skating, gold medalist Oksana Baiul filed a lawsuit this week against former agents who reportedly withheld her earnings from her, and now the athlete is asking for at least $1 million in compensatory damages. 

The 35-year-old reportedly discovered the discrepancy between her earnings and the actual amount she was being given when she hired a new finance manager last year. Baiul claimed the William Morris Endeavor Agency owed her money for several projects and that the agency used language in the contracts that was difficult for her to comprehend because of her poor English skills at the age of 16, which was when she first signed with the agency.

The suit also stated that the agency distributed portions of her earnings to people she did not even know. Baiul was able to collect $9.5 million but she believed WME hid more money than that from her, according to The Inquisitr. The lawsuit filed by Baiul's party includes the following statements:

"Not until November 19, 2011, did Baiul discover, through investigations by her personal manager, Farina, that though Defendants undertook the duty to collect and in fact collected almost U.S. $9.5 million on Baiul's behalf.

"Defendants failed to collect additional sums to which Baiul was contractually entitled, failed to remit payment of the additional sums to Baiul and/or took the payments owing to Baiul and wrongful transferred them to OCL, UFG, and their agents."

The Ukrainian-born skater won an Olympic gold medal for figure skating in 1994 at the age of 16, the same year that she signed with WME. Barbara Walter's named her "One of the 10 Most Fascinating Personalities of 1994"  in her television special and Baiul's life story was depicted in a CBS TV movie, "A Promise Kept: The Oksana Baiul Story," according to the athlete's website. She published two New York Times Best Selling books - "Secrets of Skating/Oksana Baiul" and "Oksana, My Own Story" - and has a clothing line called the Oksana Baiul Collection, a figure skating apparel line.