Afrika Bambaataa loses child sex abuse and trafficking lawsuit
Afrika Bambaataa has lost a child sex abuse and trafficking lawsuit against him due to a default judgment. The hip-hop pioneer (real name Lance Taylor) was sued by an anonymous man in 2021.
The alleged abuse took place between 1991 and 1995, making John Doe 12 years old and Bambaataa 33 or 34 years old. However, Bambaataa never responded legally, with Judge Alexander M. Tisch granting a default judgment against him “without opposition.”
In New York court records, Tisch wrote, “An assessment of damages against defendant Lance Taylor shall be referred to a Special Referee for inquest.”
68-year-old Bambaataa was first accused of molesting boys in the Bronx in 2016, with three men making allegations. In a statement to Rolling Stone, he said, “I, Afrika Bambaataa, want to take this opportunity at the advice of my legal counsel to personally deny any and all allegations of any type of sexual molestation of anyone. These allegations are baseless and are a cowardly attempt to tarnish my reputation and legacy in hip-hop at this time.”
One man, Ronald Savage, said he was a “crate boy,” aged 15, when Bambaataa allegedly molested him, but he recently took back his claims.
“Bambaataa is not a paedophile and, in my eyes, he was doing something that was consensual with someone that he thought was of age,” he told AllHipHop. “I wish, back in 2016, I remembered about the fake ID.”
He added, “This is something that took place 35 to over 40 years ago. This man has never been convicted of anything. Let it go. I needed to set the record straight [and get] my closure.”
Bambaataa is one of the creators of breakbeat DJing and behind iconic ’80s songs that shaped hip-hop in its formative years. His 1982 song ‘Planet Rock’, which sampled Kraftwerk, is a pillar for the genre.