A model who alleged Kanye West choked her and subjected her to “pornographic gagging” on the set of a La Roux music video in 2009 has spoken further about the incident.
Jennifer An, who was a finalist on America’s Next Top Model that same year, sued West for sexual assault under New York City’s Gender Motivated Violence Protection Act in November 2024.
In a suit filed at the time, the plaintiff alleged that West came to the set of the video for La Roux’s hit ‘In For The Kill’ at Manhattan’s Chelsea Hotel, on which she was a background actor, and staged “his own production” without any resistance “in a manner similar to pornographic gagging/deep throat/BDSM fetishes.”
Now in a new interview with the BBC’s Fame Under Fire podcast, An has spoken further about the incident.
She said the team were mid-shoot when the crew members suddenly stopped work and started “running around the Chelsea Hotel, they’re like, ‘Kanye’s coming, Kanye’s coming’.”
Shortly after that, she added, models “were lined up in the hallway” for West’s arrival, before the rapper “came through and chose three girls to be in the scene with him”, including An.
When filming his section of the music video, An alleged that West “couldn’t remember his lines”, shouted cut, and turned his attention to shooting a different scene. He then pulled a chair in front of the camera, An alleged, and positioned himself in a chair behind the camera, facing An but out of shot.
“I didn’t know what was gonna happen. I was given no direction. I was just told to sit in this chair.”
She added: “All of a sudden he just reaches a hand out and starts choking me, and I’m just not sure what’s happening. And then, he pulled his other hand out and starts choking me with both hands, and then starts smearing my makeup all over my face and sticking his hands inside of my mouth.”
An said the way West used his hands in her mouth “simulated oral sex”. She went on: “I feel like he was like trying to touch as much as he could.” She added that the rapper was also smearing her make-up on her face “in a way that just felt wrong”.
An also alleged that there were a lot of people on the shoot, adding that they did not intervene and “were so still and just there, staring at me”. Asked if she tried to stop West while the alleged encounter was taking place, she added: “No, I didn’t because I didn’t know what I was doing… I was more frozen, it’s like ‘I could lose my job.’”
NME contacted a spokesperson for West who did not wish to comment further.
The rapper’s lawyers previously filed a motion to dismiss the case on a variety of grounds, including the argument that because West’s conduct “occurred in the course of producing expressive” art, his actions should be shielded by free-speech protections.
But in a filing in March, An’s lawyers pushed back submitting new affidavits to corroborate her claims including alleged Instagram exchanges from La Roux (real name Elly Jackson) who remembered the choking incident vividly. “I could never forget that, it was horrific,” the singer wrote, according to court documents obtained by Rolling Stone.
In the 2024 messages, An reached out to the singer through the official La Roux account to ask whether she remembered the incident. Jackson confirmed that she did, according to the court documents, writing: “I have never seen the footage (thankfully) and obviously I asked for it to never be used or for it to be seen as you were understandably very concerned about anyone or your family seeing it.”
“I’m so sorry it happened,” Jackson added.
The case is yet to go to trial.
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.
