Former Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) Lightweight and Welterweight champion, B.J. Penn has been hit with a paternity lawsuit.
According to MMA Fighting, Camila Amado, the mother of Penn’s daughter, recently filed the suit against “Baby J” in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil for paternity recognition and alimony purposes. The move comes five months after he announced the birth of his daughter.
Per the report, Penn and Amado became romantically involved in late 2018 and she discovered she was pregnant in early 2019. After a DNA test was conducted in early 2020, it was discovered that Penn had a 99.9 chance of being the father.
Eight months after the baby was born, Penn introduced her to the world on social media as his daughter. While Camila is adamant that Penn has been in communication with her the entire time and claimed that he would do right by her, the baby — named Mahina Amado and is now a year old — still does not legally carry B.J.’s surname on her birth certificate, which is why she ultimately decided to file the suit.
“The last straw was having my daughter turn one year old. She only has my name on her birth certificate. He was always in touch with me, but always promises he would do what is right for her,” Amado told MMA Fighting.
“It’s a very upsetting situation for me, who take care of my daughter by myself. My daughter is growing up and soon she will wanna know who her father is, and he’s a public figure. He’s used my daughter’s image, my image on social media. He put her name there, Mahina Amado Penn, which would be [her full name with] his surname, but he’s none of that.”
Per the original report from Combate, Penn is very interested in legally recognizing paternity as in talks with his legal team to get it done.
“The Prodigy” was released by UFC in September of 2019 after a pair of videos showed the former champion getting knocked out during a street fight in Hawaii. He ended his UFC career with seven straight losses.