Jay-Z Files for Dismissal of Sexual Assault Lawsuit
Jay-Z has filed a motion to dismiss the ongoing lawsuit filed against him by a woman who alleges the rapper and Sean “Diddy” Combs sexually assaulted her when she was 13 years old in 2000.
Jay-Z, real name Shawn Carter, filed the new motion on Wednesday after securing the permissions to do so from United States District Judge Analisa Torres. The request, viewed by Variety, claims there are a series of inconsistencies in the woman’s account.
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Carter’s attorney Alex Spiro cites the Jane Doe accuser’s interview with NBC News in December, where she told the publication she had made “some mistakes” in her retelling of her story (also in December, Judge Torres ruled the accuser can remain anonymous in the case). Spiro argues that the accuser’s lawyer — Tony Buzbee, who already has a defamation case pinned against him from Carter — is accusing Carter of “a horrific crime without adequately vetting the allegation.”
The new motion to dismiss includes the request to impose a monetary sanction or fee award against Buzbee and the Buzbee Law Firm for “alleging facts without a sufficient investigation or by failing to withdraw those allegations once it is clear that they are false or exceedingly unlikely to be true.”
In a statement shared with Variety, Buzbee said he and his team would be addressing “the utter lack of merit with his filing with the Court, rather than with the press.”
He added, “Mr. Spiro and his firm are paid by the hour. So, they file a lot of junk with the Court. With each frantic filing, his team reeks of desperation. He and his team think the laws and rules don’t apply to them. They are flat wrong. They also think they can bully or intimidate counsel for victims by filing meritless and frivolous pleadings full of lies and half-truths.” He concluded, “They are dead wrong. We won’t be bullied or intimidated, ever.”
Judge Torres previously condemned Spiro’s “relentless filing of combative motions containing inflammatory language and ad hominem attacks [on accuser’s lawyer, Tony Buzbee].” Spiro doubles down on his claims in this new motion, claiming there are many “inconsistencies and outright impossibilities” in Jane Doe’s allegations.
Jane Doe, who filed her original lawsuit against Combs in October, re-filed it with Carter’s name in early December. Carter issued a statement almost immediately after — he referred to the claims as a “blackmail attempt,” while a separate statement from his entertainment company, Roc Nation, referred to Buzbee as an “1-800 lawyer” who is “in the pursuit of money and fame.”
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