Tiger King star Carole Baskin has been hit with a lawsuit by the family of her ex-husband Don Lewis, who was declared legally dead in 2002.

Lewis went mysteriously missing in 1997, a day before he was due to fly to Costa Rica for a business trip and two months after he had filed a restraining order against his wife.

The hit Netflix series touched on Lewis's disappearance and explored the allegations from Baskin's long-term rival Joe Exotic that she had murdered her spouse and fed him to their tigers.

Baskin, 59, has repeatedly denied the claims and dismissed them as absurd, but now Lewis's family have filed a lawsuit against her in an attempt to get her to speak on the record about his disappearance.

"Amazingly, our little family tragedy has become your tragedy," Lewis's daughter Gale Rathbone said in a press conference. "Our search for closure and truth has become your mission also.

"We all know by now that [Lewis] was not a perfect man. But do only the perfect among us deserve justice?"

Baskin commented: "It's been my policy not to discuss pending litigation until it's been resolved.

"I had told some news outlets that I thought the press conference on 10 Aug was just a publicity stunt, but at that time was not aware there would be pending litigation."

The Lewis family are also offering a reward of $100,000 (£76,300) for information about his fate.