Hulk Hogan Sex Tape Doc Sparks Suit From Wrestler’s Estate

The estate of deceased pro wrestler Terry Bollea—better known as Hulk Hogan—is fighting to block radio and internet personality Bubba the Love Sponge Clem from profiting off a documentary about Hogan’s sex tape.

All the t-shirt ripping, slogan slinging, and top-rope diving action that made Hogan an international superstar is bundled up in copyright and trademark rights that passed to his estate when he died this July. And any use of his sex tape—surreptitiously recorded by Clem in 2007—is against a confidential settlement agreement, the complaint filed in the US District Court for the Middle District of Florida alleges.

“Clem copied, reproduced, publicly displayed, and distributed portion of the Unauthorzied Video without authorization or license” when he loaded a trailer of his documentary about the sex tape scandal onto his YouTube channel, the complaint says. “Clem will engage in additional widespread copyright infringement if he releases and publishes excerpts of Unauthorized Video on the streaming services he has referenced in promoting” the documentary.

The case is the latest chapter in a scandal that sprang budget-busting litigation that altered the gossip media and defamation landscape. Hogan was secretly recorded by Clem while having sex with Clem’s wife in 2007—a tape that won Hogan a $140 million judgment against Gawker, the internet news site that published a clip of it and collapsed due to the case.

The complaint—redacted to conceal portions of a confidential settlement—says that the six-time World Wrestling Federation champ sued Clem in 2012, and as part of their secret deal Bollea got rights to the tape, which also included a conversation in which he used racial slurs. He registered his own sex tape with the US Copyright Office, and now his estate claims any use of the footage violates the law.

Weeks before his death, Clem speculated about Bollea’s death in shows across his platforms where he also promoted his documentary, titled “Video Killed The Radio Star: The Untold Story of the Hulk Hogan Sex Tape Scandal.” The trailer shows Bollea and portions of that tape—both infringements on its rights, the estate said.

“Clem has said that he has been working on this documentary for years,” the complaint said. “At no point, however, has Bollea or the Estate ever consented to the publication or dissemination of the Documentary, the content on which the Documentary appears to be based, or to Clem’s participation in a production directly related to the Unauthorized Video.”

Clem responded on social media Wednesday, saying, “Nick, how much more money do you need, buddy?” referencing Nicholas Bollea, Terry’s son and personal representative of the estate.

The estate is represented by Turkel Cuva Barrios, PA—the same firm that represented Bollea against Gawker.

The case is McCoy v. Clem, M.D. Fla., No. 8:25-cv-02334, complaint filed 9/2/25.