Former nanny Scarlett Pavlovich filed suit in three US states alleging author assaulted her in New Zealand in 2022
Federal judges have dismissed three lawsuits accusing the bestselling fantasy author Neil Gaiman of sexually assaulting his children’s nanny in New Zealand four years ago.
Scarlett Pavlovich filed a lawsuit against Gaiman and his wife, Amanda Palmer, in Wisconsin in February 2025, accusing Gaiman of multiple sexual assaults while she worked as the family’s nanny in 2022. She filed lawsuits against Palmer in Massachusetts and in New York on the same day she filed the Wisconsin action.
Gaiman has a home in north-western Wisconsin, and Palmer lives in Massachusetts. Pavlovich moved to drop the New York lawsuit against Palmer in May, explaining in court documents that she filed an action in that state because Palmer had recently relocated from New York to Massachusetts and she was unsure which state had jurisdiction. US district judge Mary Kay Vyskocil in New York granted the request in June.
Pavlovich also dropped the portion of the Wisconsin lawsuit against Palmer in May, and US district judge James Peterson in Madison dismissed the rest of it in October, saying Pavlovich needed to pursue the case in New Zealand. US district judge Nathaniel Gorton in Boston threw out the Massachusetts filing on Friday on the same grounds.
