A judge rejected American rapper Jay-Z‘s attempt to have a case against him dismissed for raping a girl who was 13 at the time in 2000.
The judge also allowed the “Jane Doe” accuser to continue in anonymity, even though the rap mogul’s legal team had pushed for her to come forward with her identity.
Shawn Carter, better known by his stage name Jay-Z, has vehemently refuted the allegations.
Judge Analisa Torres issued a harsh ruling in an order on Thursday, denouncing Carter’s attorney’s aggressive strategies in his attempt to get the case dismissed.
The judgement stated that Carter’s attorney was ineffective, a waste of judicial resources, and a strategy that was unlikely to help his client because he was constantly submitting confrontational papers with inflammatory language and ad hominem attacks. “The Court will not expedite the legal proceedings just because counsel requests it.”
In an amended lawsuit filed earlier this month, Doe claimed that she was raped by Sean “Diddy” Combs and an unnamed celebrity following the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards. The original case was filed in October. Carter was named in the updated lawsuit, making him the first famous person to be accused of sexual assault on Combs, who is currently awaiting a criminal trial after entering a not-guilty plea to three federal counts. Doe said in her complaint that both males sexually abused her after drugging her at the party.
While standing by her accusations of rape against Carter and Combs, Carter has refuted the claims on multiple occasions and pointed out contradictions in Doe’s account, which she acknowledged in a recent interview. Carter’s attorney used the contradictions to support his unprecedented request for an expedited dismissal, arguing that the action was baseless and frivolous.
Tony Buzbee, a Houston-based lawyer, is Doe’s representative. According to Buzbee, he is defending at least 120 Combs accusers.
Buzbee has come under fire from Carter’s lawyer, Alex Spiro, who claims that he extorted his well-known client.
“Since Carter’s attorney first appeared, in this case, seventeen days ago, he has submitted a litany of letters and motions attempting to impugn the character of Plaintiff’s lawyer, many of them expounding on the purported ‘urgency’ of this case,” the judge wrote in her order, denouncing Spiro for making such accusations against Buzbee.
“The judgement went on to state that “Carter’s counsel has failed to abide by this Court’s clear rules,” even though Carter’s lawyer accuses the Plaintiff’s lawyer of having a “chronic inability to follow the rules.”
“The concerted and desperate attempts to attack me as counsel for alleged victims are failing,” Buzbee told CNN in an email on Thursday.
Spiro has been contacted by CNN for comment, as have other Carter representatives.
The judge stated that “the weight of the factors tips in favour of allowing Plaintiff to remain anonymous, at least for this stage of the litigation” when she granted Doe’s motion to proceed anonymously. However, she also stated that this decision may change because “the balance of these factors will certainly shift as this case proceeds, especially if and when the parties engage in discovery in earnest, the Court intends to revisit this decision at a future date in the future.”
Doe claimed that Combs and Carter “drugged and raped her when she was only thirteen,” while Buzbee claimed that “many of his other clients who have filed similar lawsuits against Sean Combs claim to have been threatened by Mr Combs for their decision to speak out.” These factors, according to the judge’s order, were among the reasons why Doe was granted the right to proceed anonymously.
Combs’s representatives had earlier released a statement regarding Doe’s case, but they chose not to comment on the judge’s ruling.
His legal team denied that he has ever sexually assaulted anyone, saying, “This amended complaint and the recent extortion lawsuit against Mr Buzbee expose his barrage of lawsuits against Mr Combs for what they are: shameless publicity stunts, designed to extract payments from celebrities who fear having lies spread about them, just as lies have been spread about Mr Combs.”
Carter’s lawyer told reporters earlier this month that Doe’s case was “all a fantasy” and that “we expect the case to be dismissed. We anticipate that everything will fall apart if it doesn’t.”
