Brad Pitt sued by woman who claims he promised to marry her before stealing $40,000

A woman is suing Brad Pitt after claiming that he promised to marry her before stealing $40,000 for appearances at charity functions.

In the apparent catfishing scam linked to Pitt's Make It Right Foundation in 2018, Kelli Christina claims that she was contacted by the actor about raising money for the charity, which was building 150 homes in the Lower 9th ward of New Orleans following the destruction of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

In court documents cited by Daily Mail that were filed in Texas Eastern District Court, Christina claims that their working relationship developed into a personal one and there were "discussions of marriage."

Court docutments read:

"Shortly after Plaintiff was approached by Brad Pitt regarding the charitable cause, in addition to the business relationship, a personal relationship began to develop between Kelli Christina and Brad Pitt to a degree that there were discussions of marriage between the two…"

Christina claims that the actor who is worth an estimated $300 million (£231m) took an estimated $40k for Pitt to make five appearances at functions she arranged for Bitt's non-profit, however, he avoided turning up at the last minute, telling her that he would attend "next time".

The suit states: "Brad Pitt's appearance at the events was key to the events, donations to be made by attendees and was part of the agreement between Plaintiff and Defendants."

A source alleges that Christina was simply the victim of a celebrity catfishing scam.

They said: "This is a sad case of someone who was the victim of an online celebrity internet scam that had nothing to do with the actual celebrity. Hopefully, others can learn from this unfortunate situation."

Pitt has denied having ever had contact with Christina in legal papers filed in a motion to dismiss the case and said that he has never taken money from her or asked anyone else to do so on his behalf.

"Neither the Make It Right Entities nor Mr. Pitt entered into an agreement with Plaintiff. Rather, as [Christina] herself has acknowledged, it appears [Christina's] communications about any agreement were apparently with one or more individuals unlawfully posing as - but not in any way affiliated with - defendants online," it stated.

"By [Christina's] own admissions, the communications she now alleges to have had with Mr. Pitt on behalf of the Make It Right Entities, which led to the alleged agreement that forms the basis of her claims, were actually between Plaintiff and one or more individuals posing as, in Plaintiff’s words, 'fake Brad Pitts'' and not in any way affiliated with the Make It Right."

Pitt's Make It Right Foundation spent $26.9m (£20.7m) building more than 100 green homes after Hurricane Katrina between 2007 to 2016, the Metro reports.