Piper Rockelle’s life is cemented on the Internet forever. With the new release of Netflix‘s documentary Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing comes a resurfacing of allegations made against her and her mother Tiffany Smith.
Piper Rockelle started to make YouTube videos in 2016. In the years to come, she and her mom Tiffany recruited Sophie Fergi, Gavin Magnus, Sawyer Sharbino, Hayden Haas, Corinne Joy, Jentzen Ramirez, Claire Rock Smith and Symonne Harrison, to appear in her videos. Tiffany created a business enterprise operating under her company Piper Rockelle Inc. (PRI) based on the lucrative deals her daughter and friends made. In the documentary, several teenagers accounted abuse they experienced when they lived in the same house as Piper and Tiffany.
After a majority of the Squad left, eleven teenagers sued Rockwell and her mother filed a lawsuit complaining of exploitation and being “frequently subjected to an emotionally, physically and sometimes sexually abusive environment perpetrated by Piper’s mom.” They claimed that Tiffany Smith inflicted ongoing abuse such as shouting explicit comments, repeatedly touching the plaintiffs inappropriately and encouraging them to be “sexy” and “sexually aggressive” in videos. Each teenager sued the mother-daughter duo for $2 million, making the lawsuit add up to $22 million. The lawsuit was settled for a total of $1.8 million.
What is Tiffany Smith’s net worth?
In our estimation, Tiffany Smith’s net worth is around $6 million. Moviedelic cites that Tiffany and Piper’s combined net worth is estimated to be $10 million and Celebrity Net Worth reports that Piper’s net worth alone is $4 million.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Piper reportedly made between $4.2 million and $7.5 million a year from her ad deals and monetization from her YouTube channel. After the lawsuit became public, Piper and Tiffany lost brand deals, and had losses of between $300,000 and $500,000 per month. Piper still continues to make content on TikTok to this day, and because she’s a minor, her mom still controls her finances.
In a statement to the newspaper, Tiffany claimed that the lawsuit was filed because of the “financial jealousy of a 15-year-old girl.” She continued, “I don’t care. Make me look like a monster. I’m used to it. They’re using me. … But they’re hurting Piper.”
Tiffany Smith gave a statement to E! News about the documentary. “This entire ordeal—from baseless accusations to legal chaos to a Netflix reality series—has been the most painful chapter of our lives,” she said. “And it’s been especially devastating for my daughter, Piper. After everything she’s already endured, she’s now being exploited by Netflix under the guise of ‘protecting’ kids.”
The matriarch went on to urge viewers to “look past the smoke and mirrors” of the Netflix documentary, “The accusers were—and still are—stage moms pushing their kids into the spotlight,” Smith continued. “Most of the kids in the Netflix special are still chasing online fame and fortune, fully supported by their parents. As they admitted in the series, they originally approached lawyers over money and lost social media followers. Only later did other claims appear.”
