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Melissa Gorga has been in the news recently as The Real Housewives of New Jersey is back on air. However, some of her old drama is emerging as her former business partner alleges Melissa stole money from the business. Plus, she weighs in on drama with Joe Gorga and Teresa Giudice.
As fans know, Melissa has a few clothing boutiques called Envy by Melissa. Previously, she partnered with Jackie Beard Robinson, but they had a falling out.
Recently, Jackie stopped by the Beyond the Velvet Rope with David Yontef podcast to promote her new book. While on the show, she also discussed her former partnership with Melissa, which also happens to be in the book.
Regarding Melissa, she begins by saying that she would pay herself from the drawer at the store as well as use the company credit card. However, the story gets much worse.
According to Jackie, “There was like $10,000 worth of damage to the clothes. You can’t store too much there. But it ruined about $10,000 worth of clothes. And it takes forever for an insurance company to reimburse you.”
She goes on to say that she and her husband had to deposit the check from the insurance company into the business account, which of course Melissa had access to.
“And it takes forever for an insurance company to reimburse you… Just so you know, my husband was nice enough to say [that] we’ll give Melissa 20% of it. She took the check, and we never got any of it. How that happened? I still don’t know.”
She then goes on to reiterate that Melissa allegedly took the entire $10k after only being entitled to 20%.
“So my husband puts it in there. The lawyer did, and it’s gone. Gone. She took it all. Yes, it was supposed to come right back out and to us. I don’t know how that happened. I still do not know how it happened.”
She then explains why the situation upset her so much. “It burns me because we were nice enough to offer you, even after the store is settled and done, to give her 20% of it, and they took it.”
For context, this happened between seasons seven and eight.
Jackie goes on to say that Melissa then went on season eight of RHONJ and accused her of stealing the inventory. This led to her and her husband suing for defamation because Melissa’s story was hurting her reputation. Jackie also had plans to relocate one of her stores but decided not to as a result.
She says, “Because when she said that, you’re not gonna recover from that. She’s gonna tell her side of the story, and I’m never gonna tell my side of the story. I’m always gonna be like, people are gonna be like this lady could be a thief. You know, she was kind of on The Housewives, and she’s a little shady.”
Jackie ended up suing Melissa, and they went to arbitration. However, it was then decided that the case wasn’t worthy of the arbitration process.
“This took years to do, years for this case to be said, all this time and money wasted to say, oh no, we’re [not] gonna arbitrate the case. I don’t get that at all. I still don’t.”
Jackie then says she felt like she was screwed in the process. “And I asked a superior court judge I played golf with this summer in Maine. He said you got screwed. The COVID would happen. And your case got lost in the rustle of it. You got screwed.”
David then asks Jackie about the rumors that Melissa had an affair, but she doesn’t believe it happened. She also doesn’t think Joe was ever jealous.
Jackie says, “No, I don’t think so then. They had pretty young kids then, and I don’t feel that they were. I mean, they’re both kind of fun, flirtatious people.”
However, Joe did come into the store, and he had ideas for how it could grow. Jackie then remarks that she never saw him talk about his sister.
Regarding the feud, Jackie believes if either Teresa or Melissa were going to apologize, it would probably be Teresa.
According to Jackie, “She seems to be one that’ll say things like, you know what, it’s not worth it. I don’t know. I just feel like she’s the more forgiving one. I don’t know.”
She also does not think this feud is the end of Teresa and her brother. She believes they will work things out because they love each other.
Regarding the show, Jackie believes if one of them leaves, they both will.
Fans can buy Jackie’s book, Money Lies and The Housewives wherever books are sold.
