Editor’s note: This story was updated Sept. 10 with a comment from the FEI.

A Florida court has ruled against Canadian show jumper Eric Lamaze and determined that he owes the Rein family more than $5.5 million for misrepresenting the cost and ownership of various horses he sold the family, along with court costs, legal fees and interest. The judgement in favor of the Rein family comes four months after Lamaze won a legal victory in a related case, and a state appeals court reversed a $1.4 million judgement against him and returned the case to Florida Circuit Court Judge Maxine Cheeseman. 

The judgement in favor of the Rein family stems from a crossclaim the family filed against Lamaze in October 2023, after being embroiled in a suit brought by Lorna Guthrie and her deceased husband Jeffrey Brandmaier. The suit accused the Canadian rider of selling the couple’s share in show jumper Nikka VD Bisschop, who under the Reins’ ownership went on to represent Canada at the 2023 Pan American Games (Chile) and 2024 Paris Olympic Games, to the Rein family without their consent and then reimbursing them for only a fraction of the sale price. 

In the Rein family’s crossclaim, they accused Lamaze of falsely inflating the price of several horses he purchased for them and misrepresenting Guthrie and Brandmaier’s stake in “Nikka,” among other things. In her final judgement, issued Sept. 5, Cheeseman ruled that Lamaze owed the family $3,043,010 in overpayments for the five horses; $1,175,000 for “misrepresentations and statutory violations related to the Guthrie Parties’ interest in Nikka; and $310,000 in legal fees incurred as part of Guthrie’s suit—for a total of more than $4.5 million in damages—plus more than $900,000 in pre-judgement interest and an additional $88,000 in attorney’s fees for a total of $5,525,630.26.

Although the judgement commands that payment be made immediately, Lamaze has filed multiple letters with the court asking that he be given access to his bank accounts, which were frozen as part of the Guthrie case that is currently under appeal. In his letters, Lamaze said that while people helped fund his legal defense earlier in the case, which has been going on since January 2023, his resources have “since been exhausted.” He called his financial situation “dire” and said he had been unable to find a firm willing to represent him pro bono due to the complexity of the case, and that all attorneys he spoke to required a retainer of $30,000 or more, which he could not afford. 

In July, Tal Milstein Stables in Belgium announced—in a since-deleted social media post—that Lamaze would be offering coaching services there. However, the rider has been suspended by the Fédération Equestre Internationale through Sept. 11, 2027, and it was not immediately clear whether the coaching job would be a violation of the terms of that suspension. An FEI spokesperson said the organization was reviewing the matter. 

“The FEI is reviewing the situation and so far has found no evidence that Eric Lamaze has acted as a coach or has been involved in FEI-related activities,” the FEI spokesperson said in an email to the Chronicle.

A spokesperson for Lamaze did not immediately return a request for comment.