Disgraced ex-JPMorgan banker Chirayu Rana tried to wrangle a settlement from the bank worth “north of $20 million” before he filed his bombshell sexual harassment lawsuit last year, The Post has learned.
Sources familiar with the matter said the 35-year-old financier initially sought the jaw-dropping payout last June – despite the fact that an internal bank investigation had found nothing to support his claims.
“He threatened to go public and asked for millions of dollars,” one source close to the situation told The Post..
Rana was repped by attorney Gregory Chiarello at the time. Chiarello did not reply to noti.group’s request for comment.
Rana filed the suit in New York County Supreme Court in late April under the pseudonym “John Doe,” before this newspaper exclusively unmasked him last week.
He accused executive director Lorna Hajdini, 37, of drugging him and forcing him into repeated sexual encounters — claims Hajdini and the bank deny utterly, with one person briefed on the matter calling his lawsuit “a novel.”
JPMorgan said its internal investigation, which reviewed emails, phone records and witness statements, found no evidence of wrongdoing. Hajdini cooperated fully; Rana did not, the bank said.
Insiders confirmed the company had offered $1 million last month to Rana to settle the matter, as first reported by the Wall Street Journal.
The Journal said Rana’s new attorney Daniel J Kaiser then tried to counter with a $11.75 million proposal.
Top New York lawyer Jason Goldman told The Post: “Presumably, Rana sent a shakedown letter to Hajdini, threatening a public filing unless she bought his silence by paying an exorbitant fee for something she didn’t do. When she refused to succumb, Rana seemingly doubled down and dragged her name and reputation through the mud.”
The bank’s refusal to agree to Rana’s demand appears to have set the legal machinery in motion — though Rana’s preparation had begun months earlier. He seemingly consulted an AI chatbot with similar allegations about a male supervisor at Morgan Stanley.
Sources said Rana told JPMorgan supervisors in mid-December 2024 that his father had died, stringing together bereavement leave and other paid time off to collect nearly three months away from work.
His father, Chaitanya, is alive and well. The Post reached him at the family’s $1.75 million home in Vienna, Virginia. “I don’t know anything about it,” the elder Rana said. “He’s my son. He’s a good guy.”
Rana filed an internal complaint at JPMorgan in May 2025 alleging race- and gender-based harassment, then left the bank.
He landed at private equity firm Bregal Sagemount. He departed that role on April 2 — just over three weeks before the lawsuit dropped., as exclusively reported by The Post.
The suit’s central premise has also been undermined by the bank’s own internal chart that has been obtained and reviewed by The Post.
Rana and Hajdini reported to two different managing directors, meaning she had no authority over his pay or promotions whatsoever.
Hajdini’s lawyers said Rana’s claims are false.
“Lorna categorically denies the allegations. She never engaged in any inappropriate conduct with this individual of any kind and has never even been to the location where the alleged sexual assault supposedly took place.”
Rana holds a degree from Rutgers University and his journeyman career on Wall Street have included stints at Houlihan Lokey, Credit Suisse, Morgan Stanley and the Carlyle Group before joining JPMorgan’s leveraged finance team in spring 2024.
He also had a brief spell at MidCap Financial, an Apollo Global Management affiliate, where he was “managed out” after six months over performance concerns.
Rana’s attorney Daniel J. Kaiser has insisted the allegations are valid, claiming The Post would be “embarrassed” by its reporting on the scandal once all the evidence his client claims to have comes to light. The case remains active, according to the court docket.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
