Tesla chief executive Elon Musk has been sued for defamation over derogatory comments made about a British caver who helped in the rescue of 12 boys and their football coach from a Thailand cave.
Mr Musk was sued by caver Vernon Unsworth over the comments, for which the Tesla CEO had later apologised.
Tesla did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Mr Musk and the company.
The complaint filed in the US District Court in Los Angeles seeks at least $75,000 of compensatory damages, plus unspecified punitive damages.
The case adds to a slew of litigation against Mr Musk, including over his running of California-based Tesla, which the billionaire has said has caused him severe stress.
Mr Unsworth became a target for Mr Musk after cave rescuers rejected his offer of a mini-submarine created by his rocket company SpaceX to rescue the football team.
The boys and their coach were finally freed after 18 days in the cave in a major rescue operation on 10 July.
Mr Unsworth told CNN that Mr Musk's offer was a "PR stunt" that had no chance of working and that Mr Musk could "stick his submarine where it hurts".
However, he said that did not justify Mr Musk's use of Twitter and the media to defame him.
Mr Musk apologised on 18 July, referring to Mr Unsworth in saying "his actions against me do not justify my actions against him," and that "the fault is mine and mine alone".
Mr Unsworth said all of the accusations made by Mr Musk were false, and that the defamatory statements "were manufactured out of whole cloth by Musk out of a belief on his part that his wealth and stature allowed him to falsely accuse Mr Unsworth with impunity" because he disagreed with him about the mini-submarine.
