US country star Garth Brooks accused of rape, assault

Garth Brooks, one of country music’s biggest stars in the United States, has been accused of sexual assault by a woman who said he raped her in a Los Angeles hotel room and subjected her to repeated unwanted sexual advances over a period of about two years, according to a lawsuit filed Thursday in a California court.
The woman was not named in court papers but was described as a hair and makeup stylist who worked with Brooks from 2017 to about 2020. In that time, her suit says, he repeatedly harassed her, describing graphic sexual fantasies and in one instance placing her hands on his genitals when he came out of a shower.
In a statement Thursday night, Brooks said that for the last two months, he had been “hassled to no end with threats, lies and tragic tales of what my future would be if I did not write a check for many millions of dollars.”
“Hush money, no matter how much or how little, is still hush money,” he added. “In my mind, that means I am admitting to behaviour I am incapable of — ugly acts no human should ever do to another.”
Brooks, 62, is a star of the highest order in the world of country music and beyond, a household name who has sold tens of millions of albums and, decades into his career, still plays to stadiums full of adoring fans. He has also long been devoted to charitable organisations, particularly those focused on children and local relief after natural disasters.
But the suit accuses him of preying on a woman working for him and then trying to silence her.
Litigation over the woman’s accusation began three weeks ago with an anonymous suit filed in federal court in Mississippi. In that case — called John Doe v. Jane Roe — a man identified only as “a celebrity and public figure who resides in Tennessee” said that a woman residing in Mississippi had made “false and outrageous allegations of sexual misconduct she claims occurred years ago.” He asked a judge to protect his identity and to declare that the woman’s accusations against him were false.
In a filing this week in response, the woman’s lawyers portrayed that lawsuit as a pre-emptive move to silence her and said that she would be filing her case imminently, which would name the man.
The 27-page lawsuit filed by the woman Thursday, in Los Angeles Superior Court, says she is the same person listed as the defendant in the Mississippi action, and identifies Brooks as the John Doe plaintiff.
The court papers in her California case call that Mississippi case “a blatant attempt to further control and bully his sexual assault victim by utilising his multimillionaire resources to game the legal system.”
The lawsuit describes the woman as being an experienced hair and makeup artist who has worked in the entertainment industry for decades, and who had long been in Brooks’ orbit.
According to her suit, the woman was hired to in 1999 to work for country singer Trisha Yearwood, who married Brooks in 2005. The woman continued to work for Yearwood, the suit says, and in 2017 she also began working for Brooks.
In 2019, the suit says, while the woman was “experiencing financial difficulties,” she was at Brooks’ home to work and “looked up in horror as Brooks walked out of the shower, naked, with an erection.” He grabbed her hands and forced them onto his genitals, the suit says.
The woman rebuffed him, the suit says, but since she needed the work, she did not leave the house.
In May of that year, he took her on a private plane to Los Angeles for a concert. “Usually there were others on Brooks’ private jet,” the suit says, “but this time, Ms Roe and Brooks were the only two passengers.” They went to a hotel, and she realised they would be together in a suite with only one bedroom.
Brooks then stripped naked and overpowered the woman, grabbing her hands and pulling her into another room, where the suit says he raped her. The suit describes the woman as less than 5 feet tall and 100 pounds, and Brooks as 6 feet and considerably larger.
The court papers say that the encounter caused the woman “debilitating pain in her neck and lower back,” and that she had to seek treatment from her OB-GYN following the rape. She considered suicide, the suit says.
After that encounter, the suit says, the woman continued working for Brooks, and he continued to harass her by telling her about graphic sexual fantasies involving her and sending her suggestive text messages.
Around May 2020, the suit says, Brooks spoke to Yearwood and his manager about sex toys while the woman was present. Later, the suit says, she sent him a text saying she couldn’t work in such an environment. “I mean you no harm, and if you truly value my work, I am happy to show up tomorrow and/or whenever you may need my services.” According to the suit, she copied the same text into an email to Brooks, with Yearwood copied.
According to the suit, in 2020 Brooks surreptitiously took the woman’s phone and deleted some of his texts to her.
Some texts remained, the suit says, and the woman’s court papers include a partly redacted image of a text message it says are between her and Brooks and that appears to be flirtatious. That text, the suit says, was one in which Brooks “encouraged Ms. Roe to speak in a sexualised manner to him.”
By 2021, the suit says, the woman moved to Mississippi.
The suit alleges sexual assault, battery and gender violence. It was filed under California’s Sexual Abuse and Cover-Up Accountability Act, which allows sexual abuse claims to be revived that otherwise would be barred by the statute of limitations.
The suit against Brooks is the latest in a series of high-profile accusations of sexual misconduct against prominent men in the music industry over the last couple of years, many of them filed through the California law and a similar one on New York.
Over the past year, at least nine women have accused Sean Combs, the hip-hop mogul known as Diddy and Puff Daddy, of sexual misconduct, and last month Combs was charged in a federal case in New York with sex trafficking and racketeering conspiracy. He has denied those charges and is being detained at a Brooklyn jail until trial.
In a statement, Douglas Wigdor, a lawyer for the woman who sued Brooks, said, “The complaint filed today demonstrates that sexual predators exist not only in corporate America, Hollywood and in the rap and rock ‘n’ roll industries but also in the world of country music.”
Brooks referenced the Mississippi lawsuit in his statement: “We filed suit against this person nearly a month ago to speak out against extortion and defamation of character.”
He added: “I do not fear the truth, and I am not the man they have painted me to be.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.