A week after Jay-Z’s rape accuser recanted her accusations, a California appeals court has cleared the way for the star to try to revive an extortion lawsuit against the attorneys who filed the stunning abuse case.
In an order Thursday (Oct. 1), a three-judge panel of appeals judges made a key change to its ruling last month that said Jay-Z could not sue lawyer Tony Buzbee for bringing the quickly-dropped rape case on behalf of a Jane Doe plaintiff.
Jay-Z had asked the appeals court to rehear the case, arguing that Doe’s recantation was “explosive new evidence” that would change the outcome. In the new ruling, the court refused to do so, but also explicitly noted that a lower judge could still reboot the case.
“Our decision shall not prevent the trial court from ordering discovery and reconsidering its prior ruling based on any new evidence, should that court deem it appropriate,” the appeals court wrote Thursday in a ruling obtained by Billboard.
Buzbee’s lawsuit, filed in December 2024, claimed that Jay-Z and Sean “Diddy” Combs had drugged and assaulted a teen girl in 2000 during an after-party following the MTV Video Music Awards. Jay-Z immediately called the scandalous accusations a “blackmail attempt” and fought back by suing Buzbee for extortion and defamation.
But a Los Angeles trial judge rejected the star’s case last year, ruling there was no evidence that Buzbee had filed the rape claims against Jay-Z knowing they were false or had extorted him by threatening to sue. And last month, the state appeals court upheld that decision.
Two weeks later, though, Jay-Z’s accuser fully recanted her allegations, telling a judge in a separate case that her claims against the star were “false,” that she had mental health issues and that her now-former attorneys had filed the rape claims with little due diligence.
Citing that about-face, Jay-Z asked the appeals court last week to revive the case against Buzbee, arguing the recantation showed Buzbee’s lawsuit had been “built on lies” from the start: “Justice requires that this court consider this explosive new evidence which was procured today and to permit Carter’s meritorious claims to proceed.”
That request was always a legal long shot. Appeals courts cannot typically hear new evidence and must only consider a record that’s already been developed at a lower court. Jay-Z was asking the appeals court to make his case the exception, calling the situation “extraordinary.”
On Thursday, the appeals court refused to do that, denying his petition to rehear the case. And in a statement to Billboard, Buzbee’s attorneys celebrated that part of the decision, saying the court had “rejected Carter’s latest effort to disturb its ruling” and had affirmed a ruling that would allow them to demand Jay-Z reimburse Buzbee’s legal bills.
“It denied the petition for rehearing and the request to consider Jane Doe’s new declaration without even requesting a response,” Buzbee’s lawyers said in the statement. “The Court simply noted that the trial court retains its existing authority to consider new evidence if it chooses to do so. We are confident in the ruling and prepared to address whatever comes next.”
Unlike the original version of the ruling, which simply affirmed the dismissal of the case, Thursday’s new version tells the trial judge that he can reopen the case and order the new discovery Jay-Z is seeking. The case will now return to the lower court for more litigation, where the star’s lawyers have already vowed to ask to reboot the case.
“We are pleased that the Court of Appeal has invited us to ask the Superior Court to order discovery and reconsider its prior ruling based on the recent declaration from Ms. Doe,” Jay-Z’s lawyer Jeremy Rosen said in a statement. “We intend to proceed with that application as soon jurisdiction is returned to the Superior Court.”
