A defendant in the 2018 defamation lawsuit brought by Roy Moore in Etowah County has filed a counterclaim against the former U.S. Senate candidate.

Richard Hagedorn, one of the original five defendants in the lawsuit, named Moore and others in his suit for defamation and other claims stemming from a television report and an interview regarding Hagedorn leading up to the 2017 Senate special election. According to Hagedorn’s claim, Moore spokesperson Janet Porter wrongly said that Hagedorn was sentenced to prison by Moore while another report wrongly said he was charged with holding two pounds of cocaine.

Hagedorn maintains that he was indicted in 1988 for having 45.927 grams of cocaine – which is slightly more than one-tenth of a pound – and that Moore was not the sentencing judge. Moore’s lawsuit alleged that, in an effort to harm his Senate hopes, Hagedorn assisted The Washington Post in its story outlining claims of sexual abuse by Moore that roiled his campaign a month before the election.

Moore has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing associated with the allegations in The Post story, including in court documents and sworn testimony.

Circuit Judge Jack Meigs, presiding over the Etowah County lawsuit, in November 2022 dismissed five of the six counts brought by Moore against the five defendants – including all claims against Leigh Corfman, who told The Washington Post that Moore touched her in a sexual manner at his home when she was 14 years old in 1979. A jury last year in Montgomery found that Corfman and Moore had no legal claims against each other.

Meigs allowed a claim of defamation by Moore against the four remaining defendants – including Hagedorn – to proceed.

Moore’s allegations against Hagedorn in the lawsuit maintain that he aided The Post in its story, making “statements that were false and defamatory, knowing that they would harm the character and reputation of Judge Moore,” the lawsuit said. Moore’s lawsuit also said Hagedorn had friendships with women verified by social media postings who made accusations against him in the weeks leading up to the election.

Moore’s lawsuit also said he held Hagedorn in contempt in 1994 for failing to make alimony and child support payments adding up to $63,154.

In his countersuit, Hagedorn cited a One America News Network story that aired in December 2017 that said he was a “drug dealer who was caught with over two pounds of cocaine.” Hagedorn said that information on the amount of cocaine for which he was charged for holding, which he asserts was incorrect, was provided to One America News Network by Moore and his campaign. Herring Networks Inc., which operates OANN, is also named as a defendant in the counterclaim.

Hagedorn’s counterclaim said the claims against him were intentionally incorrect because a Cleburne County man, Heath Jones, had requested and received public records in Etowah County relating to Hagedorn’s arrest on drug charges and provided that information to Moore and his campaign.

Hagedorn also made a claim against Moore, his campaign and Porter for an interview Porter gave to CNN on Dec. 5 asserting that Moore sentenced Hagedorn to prison on the drug charges. Hagedorn, according to court records included with the counterclaim, pleaded guilty to trafficking cocaine.

In the interview, according to the counterclaim, Porter said, “Much like criminals who are seeking revenge, like the drug dealer that Judge Moore sent to jail just happens to have a brother who is an editor on The Washington Post.”

According to his brother’s LinkedIn page, David Hagedorn has been a food columnist and feature writer for 19 years with The Post.

At issue, though, is the claim that Moore sentenced Hagedorn following his guilty plea. According to documents accompanying the counterclaim, Judge William Rhea III in 1989 sentenced Hagedorn to 18 years in prison as well as a $50,000 fine. That sentence ran concurrently with a 10-year sentence imposed by Rhea after Hagedorn pleaded guilty in 1989 to unlawful possession of controlled substances, according to court records.

Court records included with the lawsuit indicate Rhea was the sentencing judge in 1989 following Hagedorn’s guilty pleas.

In a statement Monday to AL.com, Moore said, “Coming off a great victory in federal court for defamation against a major Super PAC in Washington D.C., I am not worried about the frivolous counterclaim of Richard Hagedorn, who was found guilty of ‘trafficking in and possession of cocaine…and sentenced to concurrent terms of 18 and 10 years.’”

In the federal court case Moore alluded to, a jury awarded him $8.2 million in August 2022 after finding that a Democrat-aligned super PAC defamed Moore in an attack advertisement leading up to the Senate election.

The counterclaim, filed by Nashville attorney Dylan Reeves, has six counts – two counts for defamation (one against Herring, Moore and his campaign; the other against Moore, his campaign and Porter), two counts of false light/invasion of privacy (one against Herring, Moore and his campaign; the other against Moore, his campaign and Porter), one count of negligence/recklessness against Moore and his campaign and one count of conspiracy against all defendants.