The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit on Thursday affirmed the dismissal of a RICO suit brought by hedge fund founder Leon Black, who accused the defendants of engaging in a plot to “extort and destroy” him by painting him as a sexual predator.

Black filed suit in the Southern District of New York in October 2021, months after Guziel Ganieva accused him of sexual assault and defamation in a state court lawsuit. In an amended complaint, Black argued that Ganieva worked with her lawyers at Wigdor LLP, PR executive Steven Rubenstein and Josh Harris, one of Black’s colleagues at Apollo Global Management, to bring down his reputation and extort money from him.