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Rapper G$ Lil Ronnie and his 5-year-old daughter were killed in a double-shooting on Monday morning (March 3) in Texas. According to local affiliate Fox 4, Lil Ronnie (born Ronnie “Chuckie” Smith) and his daughter, R’Mani, were identified by family members as victims of the shooting at a car wash in Fort Hills. Police say […]
Jay-Z is filing a lawsuit against the unnamed woman who accused him of rape last year, claiming she has now directly admitted that she fabricated those explosive allegations.
The new case, filed weeks after the lawsuit against Jay-Z (Shawn Carter) was abruptly dropped last month, alleges that the Jane Doe accuser and her attorney, Tony Buzbee, carried out an “evil conspiracy” to extort a settlement from the superstar by making “false and malicious” allegations against him.
Notably, the new lawsuit says the Doe accuser has now “voluntarily admitted” directly to Jay-Z’s team that the star did not assault her and that Buzbee “pushed” her to make those allegations.
“Mr. Carter does not commence this action lightly,” his lawyers write in a complaint filed Monday (March 3) in Alabama federal court. “But the extortion and abuse of Mr. Carter by Doe and her lawyers must stop.”
In a statement to Billboard, Buzbee sharply denied the allegations: “This case is baloney and has no legal merit. Shawn Carter’s investigators have repeatedly harassed, threatened and harangued this poor woman for weeks trying to intimidate her and make her recant her story. She won’t. Instead she has stated repeatedly she stands by her claims. These same group of investigators have been caught on tape offering to pay people to sue me and my firm. This is just another attempt to intimidate and bully this poor woman that we will deal with in due course.”
The blockbuster case against Jay-Z, filed in December, claimed that he and Sean “Diddy” Combs drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl at an after-party following the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards. It represented a shocking expansion of the already-sprawling claims against Combs and came amid speculation that other stars might be implicated in Diddy’s alleged decades of abusive behavior.
Jay-Z forcefully denied the allegations, calling them a “blackmail attempt.” He accused Buzbee of trying to extort settlements from innocent celebrities by falsely tying them to Diddy and vowed to fight back and never pay his accuser.
Last month, Doe abruptly dropped the case — without explanation and without any kind of payment from Jay-Z. Though he celebrated it as a “victory,” the star hinted he would seek to further clear his name: “When they quickly realize that the money grab is going to fail, they get to walk away with no repercussions. The system has failed.”
In filing Monday’s lawsuit, attorneys for the star are essentially seeking to impose those kinds of repercussions. They accuse Doe and Buzbee of counts of malicious prosecution, abuse of process and civil conspiracy, claiming they teamed up to abuse the court system to “assassinate the impeccable and lifetime-earned character of Shawn Corey Carter” in an effort to score a payday.
“Defendants devised and executed their plan to accuse Mr. Carter of sexual assault and used national news and media outlets to disseminate the fabricated accusations to millions despite the falsity of the accusation,” his lawyers write. “Defendants’ actions were willful and purposeful in order to maximize the reputational harm to Mr. Carter and induce Mr. Carter to pay them.”
The new lawsuit is most notable in that it claims the accuser herself has admitted the allegations against Jay-Z are false. A headline-grabbing interview with NBC News exposed serious inconsistencies in her story, and Jay-Z’s team repeatedly argued the lawsuit was frivolous. But in Monday’s complaint, his attorneys now say Doe herself has confirmed to them that the bombshell charge was not true.
“Doe has now voluntarily admitted directly to representatives of Mr. Carter that the story brought before the world in court and on global television was just that: a false, malicious story,” the lawsuit says. “She has admitted that Mr. Carter did not assault her; and that indeed it was Buzbee himself … who pushed her to go forward with the false narrative of the assault by Mr. Carter in order to leverage a maximum payday.”
It’s unclear from the complaint when exactly Doe made such admissions to Jay-Z’s representatives or in what context. Reps for his attorneys did not immediately return a request for comment.
In addition to focusing on the old lawsuit, Jay-Z’s lawyers also say the star is now facing new “extortionate threats” from Buzbee. They claim Doe’s attorneys warned them last week that if they reveal Doe’s statements admitting her story was false, they’ll issue a press release claiming she’s been “harassed” by Jay-Z’s team and that she “dropped the lawsuit only because she was afraid for her life.”
“Thus, the threats of extortion and further defamation continue to this day, necessitating that Mr. Carter take action to prevent unscrupulous actors from further preying on him,” his attorneys write.
The new case isn’t the first time Jay-Z has gone on the legal counteroffensive. Weeks before the headline-grabbing rape case was filed against him in December, attorneys for the star secretly filed a preemptive lawsuit under a John Doe pseudonym accusing Buzbee of extortion and defamation. Jay-Z’s role as the mystery plaintiff in that case was later revealed after Doe filed her rape lawsuit.
At a hearing in that case last week, a Los Angeles judge said he would likely dismiss the star’s extortion claims against Buzbee but that he would likely allow the defamation claims against the lawyer to proceed toward trial.
Liam Payne‘s family issued a strongly worded statement on Sunday (March 2) expressing their distress and disappointment at the way the press had reported on the circumstances of the late One Direction singer and solo star’s death last year.
“Liam’s death was an unspeakable tragedy. This is a time of tremendous grief and pain for those who knew and loved him,” read the statement, according to BBC News. “Liam ought to have had a long life ahead of him. Instead, [the singer’s son] Bear has lost his father, Geoff and Karen have lost their son, Ruth and Nicola have lost their brother and all of Liam’s friends and fans have lost someone they held very dear.”
The family added that they understand that the investigation into Payne’s death was “absolutely necessary, and the family recognises the work done by the Argentinian authorities. However, the family accepts the Court of Appeal’s decision to drop all charges. The constant media attention and speculation which has accompanied the process has exacted indescribable, lasting damage on the family, particularly on Liam’s son who is trying to process emotions which no seven-year-old should have to experience.”
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Their comments came just a few weeks after a court in Argentina dropped charges of criminal negligence against three of the five people indicted in connection with the singer’s passing after a fall from a third-story balcony at a hotel in Buenos Aires, Argentina last October. The court’s ruling cleared Esteban Grassi, head receptionist at the CasaSur Hotel, Rogelio Nores, an Argentine-American businessman and friend of the singer who accompanied Payne on the trip, and Gilda Martin, the hotel’s manager. Two other men, Ezequiel Pereyra and Braian Paiz, are still facing charges for allegedly supplying drugs to Payne on the night he died.
It was Grassi who made two emergency calls prior to the accident, first reporting that a guest was “trashing the entire room” and later expressing concerns that the guest “may be in danger.” A report from Argentina’s National Criminal and Correctional Prosecutor’s Office No. 14 released last month showed that an autopsy found that Payne, 31, had “alcohol concentrations of up to 2.7 grams per liter in blood” at the time of his death, or a Blood Alcohol Content (BAC) of 0.27%, which is more than three times the U.S. driving limit and just below a level that is considered life-threatening.
The Argentinian report said that in addition to the dangerous BAC, the autopsy revealed that Payne had cocaine metabolites and the medication sertraline (Zoloft) in his system before he died of what has been described as “multiple trauma and internal and external bleeding” from the 40-foot fall at the CasaSur Palermo Hotel.
In their statement, the family also wrote that they always wished “for privacy to grieve and asks that they be given the space and time to do so… Liam, you are so loved and missed.” The singer’s kin also gave thanks for a touching tribute paid to Payne at Saturday’s Brit Awards, led by his friend Jack Whitehall.
“He achieved so much in the short time that he was on this earth, and was not only a supremely gifted musician but an incredibly kind soul who touched the lives of everyone he came into contact with,” the comedian said before the screen filled with soundbites, portraits and performance video of Payne set to 1D’s “Little Things.”
“We joined in that celebration of his life and will forever remember the joy that his music brought to the world,” the Payne family wrote. Payne was buried in November in the U.K., with his funeral attended by all his former One Direction bandmates, girlfriend Katie Cassidy, and ex-partner Cheryl Cole, with whom he shared son Bear.
Lil Baby’s attorneys Drew Findling and Marissa Goldberg have responded to the Atlanta Police Department while distancing the Atlanta rapper (born Dominique Jones) from the alleged gang war and pair of teen murders the APD attempted to tie him to. Findling and Goldberg called the APD’s reference to Lil Baby “complete and total nonsense” while […]
Ye — the artist formerly known as Kanye West — is facing backlash online after he called on jewelers to help him craft a swastika chain.
“For all jewelers, I’m looking for swastika chain designs,” Ye wrote in a post on X on Thursday (Feb. 27). Attached to the message, the rapper included a video of a bedazzled swastika, and fans flooded his comments with plenty of criticism.
“Kanye will be remembered as one of the greatest artists who destroyed his own legacy,” one person commented on his message.
“Back on the bulls–t I see lmao,” another fan wrote, while someone else shared the same sentiment along with an image of Hitler that read “Hitler Returns.”
“Bro you gotta chill,” another fan pleaded with Ye, while another simply wrote, “Bro doesn’t know when to stop.”
It wasn’t just on X that people were criticizing his post. On the Kanye subreddit, users also shared their outrage at his continued display of antisemitism, with one wondering, “Doesn’t he realise that if he was alive in the time of Hitler, he would have been going into the concentration camps as well? It wasn’t just Jews they had a problem with. As a black man, he no doubt wouldn’t be accepted in their vision of the master race.”
Billboard has reached out to Ye’s team for comment.
Despite the backlash, the rapper continued putting his antisemitism on display in several early morning X posts on Friday (Feb. 28). In one message, he ranted about how some rappers write music about how many people they’ve killed, but are “SCARED TO WEAR A SWASTIKA T SHIRT” because of potential backlash from the music industry. And in another post, he wrote, “It was always a dream of mine to walk around with a Swastika T on.”
The latest wave of backlash against the Vultures rapper comes after he previously backtracked on antisemitic comments made on X earlier in February. The rant saw Ye praising Adolf Hitler and offering a T-shirt featuring a swastika on his website, a move that led to his marketplace partner Shopify taking down the website) and ushering in condemnation from the Anti-Defamation League, Charlie Puth, Lyor Cohen and others.
“As if we needed further proof of Kanye’s antisemitism,” the organization said in a statement at the time. “Kanye was tweeting vile antisemitism nonstop since last week. There’s no excuse for this kind of behavior
Ye seemingly backtracked on Feb. 19, writing on X: “After further reflection I’ve come to the realization I’m not a Nazi.”
Check out some of the fans’ reactions to his request for a swastika chain below:
https://twitter.com/MobileSuitKas/status/1895183265998266473
https://twitter.com/PlebeianPepe/status/1895436263756607705
https://twitter.com/FreightGuru3/status/1895180931469844803
https://twitter.com/marchplus17/status/1895190063014977958
https://twitter.com/FreedomToType/status/1895180565495849274
https://twitter.com/MrsNesbitt802/status/1895201119506440231
Former Bad Boy Entertainment president Kirk Burrowes has sued Sean “Diddy” Combs’ mother, Janice Small (a.k.a. Janice Combs), for allegedly coordinating with her famous son and other co-conspirators to forcefully strip him of his alleged ownership stake in the iconic hip-hop label.
Per the complaint — filed by attorney Tyrone Blackburn on Wednesday (Feb. 26) in the Southern District of New York — Burrowes claims that alongside her son, then-Bad Boy Entertainment attorney Kenneth Meiselas and other unknown co-conspirators, Smalls illegally seized his alleged 25% financial stake in Bad Boy and his 15% share of the label’s annual earnings through “intimidation, violence, fraudulent, misrepresentation and financial concealment.”
The complaint references a specific incident in May 1996 during which he claims Combs stormed into his office and proceeded to threaten him while wielding a baseball bat. Fearing for his safety, Burrowes — who claims to have co-founded the label — claims he signed a contract under duress without seeking any legal counsel, effectively conveying what he claims was his 25% interest in Bad Boy to Combs.
Burrowes, who says he served as Bad Boy’s COO/GM at the time of the 1996 incident (he was promoted to president the following year) and was “instrumental in shaping the company’s success,” alleges that losing out on his claimed 25% ownership stake and Bad Boy stock options caused him “significant financial compensation and employment benefits” along with “irreparable personal, psychological and professional harm.”
“Smalls carefully maintained a facade of integrity, portraying herself as an innocent bystander while orchestrating plaintiff’s financial and professional downfall behind the scenes,” the complaint reads.
The lawsuit further claims that Smalls requested Burrowes’ counsel as recently as 2021 on a documentary about the history of Bad Boy, but that she ultimately reneged on their compensation agreement.
Burrowes previously filed suit against Combs over the alleged 1996 incident in 2003, but that earlier complaint was eventually dismissed in 2004 by a judge in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York. (Combs is currently behind bars awaiting trial on sex trafficking and racketeering charges in a wide-ranging criminal case.)
Burrowes is seeking the return of his alleged 25% Bad Boy stake or compensatory damages matching the value of that stake, as well as an audit of Bad Boy’s earnings since the company’s origination.
Last April, Burrowes’ attorney Blackburn was referred to the grievance committee for New York’s federal court district by Judge Denise Cote for his alleged history of frivolous lawsuits. The judge cited his conduct in five different cases and claimed his filings featured “glaring deficiencies.” Two months prior, Blackburn had filed a sprawling lawsuit against Combs on behalf of producer Rodney “Lil Rod” Jones Jr., who accused the mogul of sexual assault, sex trafficking and various other forms of misconduct.
Billboard reached out to Combs Global in an effort to reach a representative for Smalls but did not hear back by press time.
A woman has sued 300 Entertainment CEO Kevin Liles for allegedly harassing and raping her while the two worked together at Def Jam in the early 2000s, according to documents filed in New York Supreme Court on Wednesday (Feb. 26).
Filed by attorneys Lucas Franken and Mallory Allen at New York firm Pfau Cochran Vertetis, the suit claims that Liles began sexually harassing the woman — identified as Jane Doe in the complaint — beginning in 2000, shortly after she started working as the executive assistant to Def Jam’s then-GM. During this time, she alleges that Liles — who was then serving as president of the storied hip-hop label — “pressed his body” against her breasts, grabbed her buttocks and made “sexually inappropriate comments and advances towards her on numerous occasions, “which she rebuffed.”
The woman claims this behavior ultimately culminated in Liles sexually assaulting and raping her.
Also named as defendants are Def Jam and its corporate parent Universal Music Group, which the woman accuses of “permitting, aiding, abetting, conspiring, ratifying and enabling” Liles’ harassment and rape. The suit alleges that the companies “knew or should have known of” Liles’ alleged propensity for sexual abuse “motivated by gender animus” and are liable for “ignoring, dismissing, and failing to take any action” against him, including by reporting him to the police. It also claims that the companies “permitted” Liles “to entrap their employees in locations that enabled his sexual abuse, assault and rape.”
As a result of the alleged harassment and assault, the woman says she suffered “severe emotional and psychological distress and personal physical injury…including severe mental anguish, humiliation, and emotional and physical distress.”
The lawsuit was brought under the Gender-Motivated Violence Protection Law in New York, which allows survivors of gender-motivated violence whose claims were previously time-barred to file suit against their alleged abusers.
The woman is asking for compensatory and punitive damages, among other relief.
Liles served as president of Def Jam Recordings in the late 1990s and early 2000s before being named executive vp at Warner Music Group. He went on to found the management firm KWL Enterprises in 2009 and, later, record label 300 Entertainment alongside Lyor Cohen, Roger Gold and Todd Moscowitz in 2012. Following 300’s acquisition by Warner Music Group in 2022, he assumed the role of chairman/CEO at 300 Elektra Entertainment. He stepped down from that role in September.
Representatives for Universal Music Group, Def Jam and Liles did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Sean “Diddy” Combs is the subject of yet another lawsuit, as a male escort has accused the disgraced Bad Boy Records mogul of sexual assault. The victim, who filed in the Southern District of New York as John Doe on Wednesday (Feb. 26) through his attorneys at Eisenberg & Baum, claims Combs sexually assaulted him […]
Halsey dropped the definitely NSFW video for their new single, “safeword,” on Thursday (Feb. 27) after teasing a 13-second preview of the track earlier this week. As promised in the sneak peek, the S&M-themed video directed by provocative stylist and Sedition Magazine editor-in-chief Lana Jay Lackey opens with a close-up of the singer rocking black-and-silver studded thong underwear, a leather jacket, leather cap and knee-high, studded, stiletto boots.
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As the song’s distorted guitar and manic, galloping rhythm kicks in, Halsey dives into dominatrix mode, kicking a leather-masked man laying on the floor in his head as they sing in a riot grrrl-inflected yelp, “Pin me to the floor, swing me by the neck/ Locked behind a door, it is time yet, time yet?/ Don’t be such a bore, gimme respect/ Are you feeling sore? Are you wet yet, wet yet?”
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Soon enough, it’s Halsey who is on the other end, as someone ties a rope around their body, pinning it to a chair as she engages in puppy play and lays prone on a table while a leather-masked dom in a suit spanks their lingerie-clad bottom before menacingly chomping on an apple. The urgent, digital hardcore-edged song hurtles to the howled chorus, “Oh, can you take it, baby?/ Oh can you handle it?/ Don’t tell me what to do, I’m gonna stand it,” with Halsey making it clear “you’re not the boss of me.”
The singer strikes a series of provocative poses throughout the rest of the clip, hanging upside down by her ankles in a mesh bra top and matching leggings — her private parts covered by black stars and a merkin — and sipping from a shake perched on a tray held up by a latex-encased living coffee table. Little is left to the imagination in the video, which also includes scenes of simulated masturbation, light pony play as Halsey rides a ball-gagged human horse and a scene of the singer trussed up and wearing a lamp shade, as well as other envelope-pushing images that bring to mind Madonna’s 1992 Sex book.
The high-energy single comes just a few months after Halsey dropped her fifth studio album, The Great Impersonator, yet another artistic pivot from the singer in which she took on a variety of musical personas on the confessional, eclectic concept album that spotlighted a mix of pop, folk and rock. It was set up by a teaser campaign in which she paid homage to a number of the LP’s inspirations, including Dolly Parton, PJ Harvey, David Bowie, Stevie Nicks, Bruce Springsteen, Kate Bush, Cher and Britney Spears, among others.
Halsey also recently announced the dates for their upcoming spring/summer 2025 Halsey: For My Last Trick tour. The 32-city Live Nation-promoted trek in support of the singer’s Columbia Records debut is slated to kick off on May 10 at the Toyota Pavilion at Concord in Concord, CA, keeping them on the road through a July 6 show at the Yaamava’ Theater in Highland, CA.
Joining Halsey on their first headlining tour in three years will be: Del Water Gap, The Warning, Evanescence, Alvvays, Hope Tala, Royel Otis, Sir Chloe, flowerlove, Magdalena Bay and Alemeda joining on select dates.
Watch the “safeword” video below.
Liam Payne‘s blood alcohol level was more than three times the limit allowed while driving in the United States at the time of the singer’s death from a 40-foot fall in Buenos Aires, Argentina in October. The results were included in a report from the National Criminal and Correctional Prosecutor’s Office No. 14 released on Friday, which showed that an autopsy found that the former One Direction member and solo star had “alcohol concentrations of up to 2.7 grams per liter in blood” at the time of his death.
While Payne, 31, was not driving at the time, for context, the legal blood alcohol content (BAC) in the U.S. for drivers over 21 is 0.08%; 2.7 grams per liter translates to 0.27% BAC, which is more than three times the U.S. driving limit.
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According to the American Addiction Centers’ Alcohol.org, that BAC can cause, “confusion, feeling dazed, and disorientation… Sensations of pain will change, so if you fall and seriously hurt yourself, you may not notice, and you are less likely to do anything about it.” Other potential effects include: blackouts, nausea, vomiting and impairment of the gag reflex, “which could cause choking or aspirating on vomit.”
The Cleveland Clinic also notes that while a BAC of 0.15%-0.30% can cause the above symptoms and drowsiness, Payne’s measured level was just below the BAC (0.30%-0.40%) that can cause alcohol poisoning, “a potentially life-threatening condition… [which can cause a] loss of consciousness.”
The Argentinian report noted that in addition to the dangerous BAC, the autopsy revealed that Payne — whose death it said was a result of “multiple trauma and internal and external bleeding” caused by a fall from a three-story hotel balcony — also had cocaine metabolites, methylecgonine, benzoylecgomine, cocaethylene and the medication sertraline (Zoloft).
The prosecutor’s office announced in November that a toxicology report said Payne had “alcohol, cocaine and prescription antidepressants” in his system when he died on Oct. 16.
Last week, an Argentinian court dropped charges of criminal negligence against three of the five people indicted in connection with Payne’s death. The court cleared the head receptionist at the CasaSur Hotel, Esteban Grassi, Argentinian-American businessman Rogelio Nores, a friend who accompanied Payne on the trip, and Gilda Martin, the hotel’s manager. Grassi made two emergency calls prior to the deadly accident, first reporting that a guest was “trashing the entire room” and later expressing concerns that the guest “may be in danger.”
In a recent Rolling Stone exposé, Payne’s former girlfriend, model Maya Henry, described the singer’s longtime struggles with depression and addiction, saying he became “someone unrecognizable” when he was using substances.