Jay-Z accused of raping, drugging 13-year-old girl with Sean 'Diddy' Combs in 2000
Jay-Z has been accused of sexually assaulting a teenage girl alongside Sean "Diddy" Combs in the early 2000s.
In an amended lawsuit filed Sunday, an Alabama woman — identified anonymously as Jane Doe — claims the billionaire music mogul, born Shawn Carter, and Combs drugged and raped her at an after-party following the MTV Video Music Awards in September 2000 in New York. The woman brought a lawsuit against Combs in October for the alleged assault.
Doe also alleges that another unnamed celebrity "stood by and watched as Combs and Carter took turns assaulting" her. NBC News was the first to report the news.
"Combs has been allowed for years to conduct himself in this manner without any consequences," reads the lawsuit, filed by Texas-based attorney Tony Buzbee. "He believes he is above the law. He is not. His close friend Shawn Carter has been with Combs during many such instances. ... Both perpetrators must face justice."
Jay-Z vehemently denied the allegations against him in a statement Sunday.
The claims against Jay-Z come amid an avalanche of legal woes for Combs, who was arrested in September on charges of racketeering, sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution. The embattled hip-hop mogul has been held in custody at the Special Housing Unit in Brooklyn's Metropolitan Detention Center ahead of his upcoming May 5 trial.
In his 14-page indictment filed in federal court, Combs was accused of turning his "multi-faceted business empire" into a "criminal enterprise" in which he and his associates engaged in kidnapping, arson and physical violence, sex trafficking and forced labor, among other crimes.
In a statement provided by his representative Jana Fleishman, Jay-Z called Buzbee’s lawsuit a “blackmail attempt.”
"What he had calculated was the nature of these allegations and the public scrutiny would make me want to settle," Jay-Z said of Buzbee in the statement. "No sir, it had the opposite effect! It made me want to expose you for the fraud you are in a VERY public fashion. So no, I will not give you ONE RED PENNY!!"
Jay-Z, who is married to pop superstar Beyoncé, went on to say that his "only heartbreak is for my family." The couple shares three children: daughter Blue Ivy, 12, and fraternal twins Rumi and Sir, 7.
"My wife and I will have to sit our children down, one of whom is at the age where her friends will surely see the press and ask questions about the nature of these claims, and explain the cruelty and greed of people," the rapper said.
"I mourn yet another loss of innocence. Children should not have to endure such at their young age. It is unfair to have to try to understand inexplicable degrees of malice meant to destroy families and human spirit."