Judge upholds decision requiring paternity test of Cowboys owner Jerry Jones

DALLAS (AP) - A judge has upheld a decision requiring Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones to take a paternity test as part of a legal dispute with a 27-year-old woman who claims the billionaire is her biological father.

A Texas judge on Wednesday rejected an appeal from Jones of a 2022 ruling in a paternity case brought by Alexandra Davis, who previously alleged in a separate lawsuit she was conceived from a relationship Jones had with her mother in the mid-1990s.

Attorneys for Jones are challenging the constitutionality of the Texas law that would compel genetic testing of Jones.

In March 2022, Davis sued Jones in Dallas County, asking a judge to void a legal agreement she said her mother, Cynthia Davis, reached with Jones two years after she was born. The 1998 settlement allegedly said Jones would support them financially as long as they didn't publicly say he was Alexandra's father - something the married owner of the Cowboys has denied.

Davis dropped that case a month later, saying she would instead seek to prove that Jones is her father. She soon filed the paternity case.

The 81-year-old Jones and his wife, Gene, were married in 1963. They have three children, and all have front office roles with the Cowboys. Jerry Jones is the team president and general manager.

Davis' original lawsuit claimed that Jones "pursued" Cynthia Davis, who was also married at the time, after they met while she was working for American Airlines out of Little Rock, Arkansas.

Their settlement allegedly called for Jones to pay Cynthia Davis $375,000 and for Alexandra Davis to receive a "certain monthly, annual and special funding" from a trust until she was 21, as well as lump sum payments when she turned 24, 26 and 28.

Attorneys for Jones say Alexandra Davis has received "millions of dollars" from Jones in her lifetime, according to court documents.

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