Jay-Z accuser has admitted to discrepancies in her initial report
The 38-year-old Alabama woman who accused Sean ’Jay-Z’ Carter and Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs of raping her when she was 13 at a 2000 after-party has admitted that there were factual discrepancies in her account.
The accuser, who remains anonymous, and is identified only as ‘Jane Doe’, filed a lawsuit on December 8th, which accused the pair of raping her at an after-party for the MTV Video Music Awards. The federal lawsuit was originally filed in the Southern District of New York in October, listing Combs as the defendant, but was refiled on December 8th to include Carter.
The Texas-based attorney, Tony Buzbee, filed the suit, which comes amid several others he’s filed in recent months accusing Combs of assault and rape. All withhold the complainants’ names; this is the first to name another prominent figure.
The suit claims that Doe didn’t have a ticket to the ceremony at Radio City Music Hall, so she approached various limousine drivers hoping to get in. Allegedly, one driver said that he worked for Combs and that she “fit what Diddy was looking for.” She claims he invited her to the after-party and instructed her to return to return to his car after he’d taken Combs and Jay-Z – real name Shawn Carter – back.
According to the suit, the driver picked her up and took her to a white house with a U-shaped driveway. She claims to have signed a nondisclosure agreement, and recalls the party was filled with celebrities doing cocaine and marijuana.
The complainant says she was offered a drink that made her “woozy, lightheaded and felt [like] she needed to lie down,” so she went into a room to rest. Allegedly, Combs and Carter entered the room, with the former saying, “You are ready to party!”
She then alleges that Carter removed her clothes, held her down, and raped her while Combs and an unnamed female celebrity watched. She says Combs also raped her, as Carter and the woman observed. The suit maintains she resisted performing oral sex on Combs by hitting him in the neck. After the alleged assault, the suit claims she grabbed her clothes and left, went to a petrol and called her father. She is seeking unspecified damages.
Jay-Z has vehemently denied all the allegations and issued a statement following the lawsuit being filed, wherein he urged Buzbee to file a criminal lawsuit given the “heinous” nature of the allegations. Combs’ legal representatives also dismiss the suits he faces as publicity stunts.
In response to Doe’s suit, Jay-Z has also filed a motion for Doe’s identity to be made public.
What are the inconsistencies in Jane Doe’s Jay-Z suit?
Things have now taken a different turn, as Doe has admitted to NBC News that there were “some mistakes” in her recollections of that night 24 years ago. Remaining anonymous, she recalled the “catastrophic event”. She says she stands by her overall allegations, with the inconsistencies in her account of the incident not necessarily meaning the claims are false.
The inconsistencies include the woman’s father saying he doesn’t remember picking her up after the alleged assault. There’s also a celebrity she claims to have spoken to at the party, but that celebrity said she was not in New York then. Furthermore, images from that evening show Carter and Combs at a different location from the one she described. However, their whereabouts for the entire evening are unclear. Images reviewed by the outlet show Combs and Carter at the Lotus Nightclub at one after-party, but it’s not clear what time the photos were taken, or if the pair attended other after-parties.
Carter provided another statement to the outlet on Friday. “This incident didn’t happen,” he maintained, “and yet he filed it in court and doubled down in the press,” he added, referring to Buzbee. “True Justice is coming. We fight FROM victory, not FOR victory. This was over before it began. This 1-800 lawyer doesn’t realize it yet, but, soon.”
Buzbee says he’s continuing to vet her claims, and says Doe’s case was referred to his firm by another one. He asserts they are continuing to vet her claims and collect corroborating data as much as they can. “We have interrogated her intensely”, he told the outlet, saying she is adamant her story is true, “to the best of her memory”. She’s even agreed to a polygraph test.
“You should always fight for what happened to you,” Doe said explaining why she is going public after all these years. “You should always advocate for yourself and be a voice for yourself. You should never let what somebody else did ruin or run your life. I just hope I can give others the strength to come forward like I came forward.”
Her father also spoke to the outlet, and told them on Thursday that he does not remember that particular incident, but does recall once picking her up in the middle of the night. She stands by that part of the claim and says he may have misremembered.
The woman also told NBC News that she spoke with Good Charlotte guitarist Benji Madden at the after-party, and discussed his ‘The Last Supper’ tattoo. However, a representative for the musician said neither he nor his brother Joel were at the 2000 VMAs as they were on a Midwest tour at the time. The woman does not accuse them of any wrongdoing.
“Honestly, what is the clearest is what happened to me and [the] route that I took to what happened to me. Not all of the faces there are as clear,” Doe said. “So I have made some mistakes. I may have made a mistake in identifying.”
Earlier this week, Carter demanded an emergency court hearing to address the allegations.
For help, advice or more information regarding sexual harassment, assault and rape in the UK, visit the Rape Crisis charity website. In the US, visit RAINN.