Juventus
soccer star Cristiano Ronaldo took to Instagram Live on Sunday to call a 2009
rape allegation against him "fake news."
According
to Maya Oppenheim of the Independent, Ronaldo added, "They want to promote
my name. It's normal. They want to be famous to say my name, but it is part of
the job. I am a happy man and all good."
Ronaldo
was responding to a report in German magazine Der Spiegel in which 34-year-old
Kathryn Mayorga said he raped her in a Las Vegas hotel room nine years ago.
Ronaldo
reportedly reached a $375,000 settlement with Mayorga in 2010 in exchange for
agreeing to never go public with the allegations. Mayorga's lawyers are
reportedly attempting to void the non-disclosure agreement.
According
to Oppenheim, Ronaldo has denied the allegations and said the sex with Mayorga
was consensual.
Ronaldo's
lawyers released a statement calling Der Spiegel's reporting "blatantly
illegal" and saying they will seek "moral damages in an amount
corresponding to the gravity of the infringement, which is probably one of the
most serious violations of personal rights in recent years."
The
33-year-old Ronaldo is in the midst of his first season at Juventus after
spending the previous nine campaigns at Real Madrid.
He
is a five-time winner of the Ballon d'Or, the award given to the top soccer
player in the world, and Forbes listed him as the third-highest paid athlete in
the world this year with an income of $108 million.
