Jack Avery filed for a temporary restraining order in California, seeking sole legal and physical custody of his 7-year-old daughter Lavender after Gabbie Gonzalez’s murder-for-hire arrest. He alleges the FBI warned him to stay away and claims friends came to
Jack Avery didn’t wait for the news cycle to settle. On Tuesday, he rushed to the courthouse to file for a temporary restraining order against Gabbie Gonzalez, alongside a request for sole legal and physical custody of their 7-year-old daughter, Lavender.
The move comes after Gabbie was arrested in California last week on allegations that she conspired to hire a hitman to kill Jack—her baby daddy and a former member of the boy band Why Don’t We—during their 2021 custody dispute. Jack says the FBI told him Gabbie. her father Francisco Gonzalez. and her friend Kai Cordrey conspired to arrange the murder-for-hire plot.
Gabbie’s alleged accomplice network didn’t stop there. Her dad, Francisco Gonzalez, was arrested on Monday in Florida for the same alleged crime.
Jack has kept quiet publicly about the arrests so far. but the court filing reads like a man trying to keep his daughter—and himself—from getting caught in the aftermath. He is asking that Gabbie not be near him or Lavender. and he is also seeking to block her visitation with the child due to the criminal proceedings.
In the documents. Jack argues that sole custody would let him get Lavender a therapist so she can process what he describes as a traumatic experience. He says Lavender was staying with a foster family after Gabbie’s arrest on Friday. Jack then flew to Northern California to pick her up—but when he arrived. he alleged he was told Lavender blamed him for her mother’s arrest. He also claims Gabbie has been bashing him in front of their daughter.
The filing also paints a picture of escalating fear at Jack’s home. Jack alleges that since Gabbie’s arrest, her family kept reaching out to him to find out where Lavender was. He claims the situation turned more intense on Saturday. when two of Gabbie’s friends came to his house. banged on the front door. and checked his Ring camera while telling him they could “do this all day.” Jack says he now feels he and Lavender aren’t safe in his home.
He also alleges Gabbie traveled with Lavender around the world before her arrest and refused to tell him where they were. Jack says he didn’t even know they were in Northern California until the TikToker was arrested. He adds that the FBI warned him it wasn’t safe for him to be around Gabbie. but he says he pushed through the custody exchanges anyway—claiming he had to learn “to manage my own fears and anxiety” during visits.
The legal drama has another layer: Gabbie’s estranged husband, Cody Clayburn, posted about her arrest online almost immediately. After news broke. Cody took to Instagram Stories to celebrate. sharing Gabbie’s mugshot with the caption “Karma.” It turns out he wasn’t just reacting—he was tied to the case as a key witness.
Court documents obtained by TMZ describe how Cody and McKenzie Ferry exposed the alleged murder-for-hire plot. The account says McKenzie was a live-in nanny for Gabbie and alerted authorities about the scheme in 2021. Cody, meanwhile, was “married” to the social media star after she had Lavender with Jack, but not legally.
The LA County Sheriff’s Department claims Cody told police that Gabbie was in a nasty custody battle and that Francisco got heavily involved. Cody allegedly told investigators the pair were “obsessed” with getting full custody of Lavender. The filing also states that Francisco once said it would have been cheaper if Jack were dead.
The couple’s relationship didn’t stop law enforcement from looking into the case. TMZ reports that after Gabbie and Cody got married in 2022. the FBI raided their home in Hawaii. confiscated electronics. and interviewed Gabbie. Sources say McKenzie’s report triggered the raid, and that Jack had been notified about the alleged plot by then.
Even so, the matter didn’t move straight to arrests. Insiders claim the FBI initially believed it didn’t have enough evidence and handed the case over to the LA County Sheriff’s Department last year. The department then reinterviewed witnesses and determined they had sufficient grounds for the arrests.
Police allegedly planned to arrest Gabbie in June during a child custody exchange. But the filing says she stopped communicating with Jack, and the timeline was moved up.
A custody battle has become something far more dangerous in Jack Avery’s telling—one that now has him seeking court protection. asking for sole custody. and insisting his family needs distance from Gabbie as the criminal case unfolds. For his daughter Lavender. he says the next steps are therapy and stability after what he describes as an alarming. fast-moving ordeal.
Jack Avery Gabbie Gonzalez Cody Clayburn Lavender restraining order custody murder-for-hire plot FBI Francisco Gonzalez Kai Cordrey McKenzie Ferry Why Don’t We Instagram Stories Hawaii raid