genre rb

Smokey Robinson has filed a countersuit against four longtime housekeepers who accused him of rape earlier this month, claiming the allegations were part of an “extortionate scheme” by the women and their attorneys.

The new cross-complaint, filed in Los Angeles court Wednesday (May 28), came three weeks after the unnamed housekeepers filed a $50 million civil lawsuit over allegations that the legendary Motown singer repeatedly raped them over nearly two decades in his employ.

In filing the countersuit, defense attorneys for Robinson went on offense — accusing the four women and their attorneys (John W. Harris and Herbert Hayden) of defamation, invasion of privacy, civil conspiracy and even elder abuse over the “fabricated” allegations.

“The depths of plaintiffs’ avarice and greed knows no bounds,” Robinson’s attorney Christopher Frost writes, according to a copy of the submitted complaint obtained by Billboard. “During the very time that the Robinsons were being extraordinarily generous with plaintiffs, plaintiffs were concocting an extortionate plan to take everything from the Robinsons … and wrongfully destroy the Robinsons’ well-built reputations.”

Allegations made during court cases, such as those against Robinson, are typically shielded from defamation lawsuits by the First Amendment. But Robinson’s attorneys say the accusers and their lawyers stepped outside those protections by holding a press conference in which they “paraded themselves in front of the media” and created a “media whirlwind.”

“While the law protects plaintiffs’ ability to concoct whatever fiction they may wish to create in a legal pleading … it does not allow plaintiffs to make gratuitous and slanderous allegations in media circus-type press conferences,” Frost wrote in the cross-complaint.

Attorneys for the accusers did not immediately return a request for comment on Wednesday. Frost confirmed that the cross-complaint was filed with the court on Wednesday but declined to comment otherwise.

Robinson was sued on May 6, accused of forcing the housekeepers to have oral and vaginal sex in his Los Angeles-area bedroom dozens of times between 2007 and 2024. The singer’s wife, Frances Robinson, was also named as a defendant over claims that she didn’t do enough to stop the abuse, despite knowing that he had a history of sexual misconduct.

In addition to the sexual abuse allegations, the lawsuit also claimed that the Robinsons paid their employees below minimum wage, and that Frances Robinson created a hostile work environment replete with screaming and “racially-charged epithets.” The accusers also filed a police report, leading the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department to open a criminal investigation.

In Wednesday’s countersuit, the Robinsons’ attorneys told a very different story. They said the housekeepers had “stayed with the Robinsons year after year” because the couple had treated them as “extended family,” including financially helping them and celebrating holidays together. The complaint quoted alleged text messages in which the accusers wished Robinson a happy birthday and told him “love you.”

“The Robinsons did not abuse, harm, or take advantage of plaintiffs,” Frost wrote. “They treated plaintiffs with the utmost kindness and generosity.”

According to Wednesday’s new filing, the housekeepers and their lawyers made “pre-litigation demands for $100 million or more” before filing their case. When that failed to work, the new filing says the accusers went public with the allegations as loudly as they could.

“The resulting media whirlwind was swift and severe, being picked up by virtually every major media outlet worldwide, and the harm to the Robinsons’ reputation [is] palpable,” Frost wrote. “The Robinsons are afraid to open the newspaper, read the internet, or even go out in public for fear of what they may hear or see next, no matter how fabricated.”

The filing focused on statements by Harris, the attorney, at a May 6 press conference calling Robinson a “serial and sick rapist” and a “serial assaulter” — statements that Robinson says are fair game for a defamation case: “Plaintiffs may be able to make slanderous statements in a legal pleading (for now), but they are not entitled to do so in gratuitous, self-serving press conferences.”

In addition to defamation and other wrongdoing, the Robinsons say the accusers tried to “hide, conceal, and destroy evidence exposing their illegal scheme,” including by taking Frances Robinson’s phone and deleting text conversations. The filing hinted that the Robinsons would seek additional penalties for such “spoliation” of evidence.