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1. Bilaal Salaam is asking a judge to order Jada Pinkett Smith to sit for another deposition within 30 days.
2. Pinkett Smith’s attorneys argue that she has already answered questions in a related proceeding and that any additional examination should be strictly limited.
3. The dispute arrives after Pinkett Smith won a major anti-SLAPP ruling and more than $32,000 in legal fees.

By Samuel López | USA Herald

LOS ANGELES — The legal battle between Jada Pinkett Smith and Bilaal Salaam, the former associate of Will Smith who has publicly described himself as the actor’s longtime friend, has moved into a new and potentially consequential phase: a fight over whether Pinkett Smith must sit for another sworn deposition.

In newly reported court filings, Salaam asks a Los Angeles judge to compel Pinkett Smith to appear for questioning within 30 days, arguing that her testimony is necessary to explore alleged communications about him and any purported authorization of threats directed toward him. Salaam claims he noticed a deposition for May 20, but Pinkett Smith did not appear and has not agreed to another date.

The request does not decide whether Salaam’s allegations are true. It instead puts the immediate focus on civil discovery: whether Pinkett Smith can be required to submit to further examination under oath, and if so, how broad that questioning may be.

Salaam’s lawsuit, filed in late 2025, seeks $3 million and alleges that Pinkett Smith confronted him at a September 2021 gathering connected to Will Smith’s birthday. He claims she and members of her entourage became verbally aggressive and that she warned he could “end up missing or catch a bullet” if he continued discussing her personal business. Pinkett Smith has denied the allegations.

The complaint also stems from a far wider feud involving Salaam’s public allegations about Will Smith, a proposed memoir, and claims that he faced retaliation after refusing to assist with what he characterized as crisis-management efforts following Smith’s onstage slap of Chris Rock at the 2022 Academy Awards. Pinkett Smith’s attorneys have described Salaam’s allegations as false, uncorroborated, and part of what they characterize as a campaign of harassment against the Smith family.

But the newest filing underscores a legal reality often overlooked in celebrity litigation: even after major claims have been dismissed, the surviving portions of a case can produce significant discovery disputes.

According to the court documents described by TMZ, Pinkett Smith’s legal team has argued that she already appeared for a deposition in a separate proceeding brought by Salaam involving overlapping issues. Her attorneys reportedly maintain that another full-day examination is unwarranted and that any additional questioning should be limited to one hour.

That argument matters.

A judge considering a motion to compel will not simply decide whether Salaam wants testimony. The court will likely examine whether the proposed questioning is relevant to the remaining claims, whether Salaam already had a meaningful opportunity to obtain the same evidence, and whether a second deposition would be cumulative or unnecessarily burdensome.

Salaam, for his part, appears to be arguing that Pinkett Smith herself is central to the allegations and that her testimony could clarify who communicated with whom, what was said, and whether any alleged threats were directed, authorized, or denied. His position is legally understandable: a plaintiff alleging direct threats by a defendant will often argue that the defendant’s sworn testimony is indispensable.

Pinkett Smith’s response raises an equally important procedural concern. Civil discovery is not intended to become a mechanism for repeated questioning where substantially similar testimony has already been obtained. The court may decide that a narrowly limited deposition is appropriate, deny the request altogether, or permit questioning confined to specific subjects not covered in the earlier proceeding.

The dispute lands after Pinkett Smith’s substantial early win under California’s anti-SLAPP statute, a law designed to protect speech and petitioning activity from meritless litigation intended to chill public participation. Under California Code of Civil Procedure section 425.16, a prevailing defendant on a successful anti-SLAPP motion is generally entitled to recover attorney’s fees and costs, while discovery is typically stayed during the pendency of the motion unless a court permits narrowly tailored discovery for good cause.

Earlier this year, a Los Angeles judge struck a significant portion of Salaam’s case and later ordered him to pay Pinkett Smith $32,836 in attorney’s fees and costs—less than the approximately $49,000 her attorneys had sought. The fee ruling reflected Pinkett Smith’s partial success on the anti-SLAPP motion, not a final adjudication of every remaining issue in the case.

That distinction is critical.

A partial dismissal can narrow a lawsuit dramatically without eliminating it entirely. And where claims remain alive, discovery can become the next battlefield—especially in a case built around alleged conversations, purported threats, private communications, and sharply conflicting accounts of what happened behind closed doors.

For now, the court has not ruled on Salaam’s deposition request. The judge’s decision could determine whether Pinkett Smith must provide additional sworn testimony, whether the examination will be restricted in time and scope, or whether Salaam will have to pursue other evidence to support what remains of his case.

The case has already produced high-profile accusations, a major anti-SLAPP victory, six-figure litigation stakes, and a court-ordered fee award. The next ruling may not resolve the feud—but it could decide how much further the parties are permitted to probe each other under oath.

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