Dickerson Target of Paternity Suit by Ex-Girlfriend

A woman claiming to be the former fiancee of Eric Dickerson filed a paternity suit against the Ram running back in Los Angeles Superior Court Monday, seeking financial support for her unborn child she claims was fathered by Dickerson.

In the complaint, Rea Ann Silva claims that since breaking off their engagement, Dickerson has stopped paying medical bills that have accrued during her pregnancy. The child is due in November.

Silva also contends in the suit that Dickerson has threatened her with bodily harm and that on June 2, 1987, he entered her North Hollywood home and pointed a cocked .350 magnum pistol at her head.

Dickerson, through agent Charles Chin, vehemently denied the allegations Monday.

The Superior Court has issued a temporary restraining order against Dickerson, prohibiting him from traveling within 100 yards of Silva’s home and her place of employment. Silva works at a Los Angeles area department store.

“There’s a great deal of concern for Ms. Silva’s safety,” Silva’s attorney, Ronald Cooper, said.

Cooper said that criminal assault charges against Dickerson may be filed pending an investigation by the district attorney’s office. A spokesman in the district attorney’s office said, however, that he knew of no such investigation.

Cooper said that a preliminary hearing has been scheduled for Aug. 4.

“Paternity action has been filed and a hearing is scheduled seeking payment of support,” Cooper said.

Silva, also a model and actress, said Monday that legal action was her last recourse.

“I do not want criminal prosecution,” she said. “That’s something that gets done in the process. I tried very hard to resolve this. I talked with him several times. He promised to address it, then failed to do so.”

Dickerson’s attorney, Fred Glassman, issued the following statement Monday:

“We are investigating all the facts surrounding Ms. Silva’s allegation against our client, Eric Dickerson. If he is determined to be the father of the unborn child, he is certainly aware of his responsibility and would fulfill them and would further welcome the opportunity to share in the right of parenting. Any further comment at this time as to specific statements by Ms. Silva or her attorney would be inappropriate.”

Dickerson officially issued a no-comment statement through Chin, but Dickerson did relay to Chin that the accusations against him were totally false.

“He’s in a state of shock,” Chin said of Dickerson. “He’s stunned that she said what she did. So much of it is bull. Eric has never threatened to kill her. Eric will take full responsibility for the child once it’s proven that it’s his. He does not feel obligated to her. In his opinion, she was just a typical girl that wanted to luck out with a celebrity.”

Silva said she met Dickerson two years ago through a mutual friend and that they were engaged to be married last Mother’s Day.

Dickerson actually announced their engagement when the two appeared together on the “Oprah Winfrey Show” last May 25, but Chin said Dickerson only said it because he “didn’t want to humiliate her because she was pregnant.”

According to the complaint, Dickerson entered Silva’s home in North Hollywood June 2 and “removed clothes, personal property and destroyed pictures of them together.”

It further contends that Dickerson then “pointed the gun at her and demanded she give him the engagement ring. He cocked the gun and threatened to shoot her. He took a wristwatch, diamond gold earrings, neither of which he had given her. He said he wouldn’t return the items until she returned the ring.”

Chin provided Dickerson’s accounts of that evening.

“She lives in a bad area of North Hollywood, and he kept the gun there because at one time his car had been broken into,” Chin said. “When he picked up his belongings, he picked up his gun. She twisted the story, saying he pointed the gun at her. That’s baloney.”

Silva said that Dickerson on that night “went into a frenzy. I had never seen him like that.”

She said she made several attempts to work out a deal of child support in the following days.

“I even gave him the option of going to an attorney and saying if it’s fair, Ill sign it,” she said.

Silva said she only decided to take legal action on July 7, after Dickerson left a phone message laced with obscenities on her answering machine.