A Las Vegas woman filed a $10 million lawsuit against the 15 year old online dating service Match.com, after she met a prospective love interest on the site that almost killed her two years ago. In 2010, Mary Kay Beckman joined Match.com approximately one month before meeting Wade Ridley in person for the first time. She broke up with him after dating him for just eight days. After the breakup, Ridley began stalking Beckman, sending her threatening messages.
Four months later, Beckman said that Ridley broke into her garage and brutally attacked her outside of her home, stabbing her 10 times in the head. When the knife broke, he smashed her head with a rock and began stomping her head repeatedly and then left her for dead. "I shouldn't even be here today," Beckman told KLAS-TV.
Ridley was arrested by police and had no prior criminal record, but he admitted to killing another woman in Phoenix, Ann Simenson, who he also met on Match.com. He committed suicide in prison last year while serving a 28 to 70 year sentence for the murder of Simenson, before he could be tried for the brutal attack on Beckman. Beckman believes that Match.com is responsible for her attack, claiming that the site is misleading. Her attorney, Marc Saggese of Saggese and Associates said, "The basis of the lawsuit is the advertising that is utilized by Match.com, lulling women and men into a false sense of security."
As a result of the attack, Beckman has undergone multiple surgeries in attempts to repair the physical damages sustained by the horrific attack. A part of her skull had to be replaced with synthetic material. In a statement released on Monday, Match.com said that Beckman's lawsuit is "absurd".
"The many millions of people who have found love on Match.com and other online dating sites know how fulfilling it is. And while that doesn't make what happened in this case any less awful, this is about a sick, twisted individual with no prior criminal record, not an entire community of men and women looking to meet each other.", the site said.
