Jay-Z has revealed he experienced “uncontrollable anger” following allegations made against him in a 2024 rape lawsuit.
The rapper and music mogul has spoken out about his reaction after being accused of raping an anonymous woman when she was 13 years old.
In an interview with GQ, Jay-Z – whose real name is Shawn Carter – shared that he was “heartbroken” by the claims.
“It was hard. Really hard. I was heartbroken,” he said. “I’m glad we got right to that so we could just get that out the way. Like, I was really heartbroken by everything that occurred.”
“We’re in a space now where it’s almost like consequence is not thought about enough,” the 56-year-old continued. “Because everything is so instant, you know what I’m saying?”
Jay-Z went on to describe the emotional toll the allegations had taken on him.
“That whole (lawsuit thing), that s**t took a lot out of me. I was angry. I haven’t been that angry in a long time, uncontrollable anger,” he stated. “You don’t put that on someone – that’s a thing that you better be super sure.”
The Empire State Of Mind hitmaker maintained that he lived by “strict” personal rules, which he said guided his conduct.
“You had to be super sure before you put those kind of things on a person. Especially a person like me,” he told the publication. “Even when we were doing the worst things, we had those kind of rules. There was a line: no women, no kids.”
“You hear those sayings, but those are the things that I took from the street,” he continued. “We lived and died by that. So it’s strict for me, like it meant a lot to me.”
While acknowledging he took the allegations “really hard”, Jay-Z said he remained confident in the outcome.
“I knew that we were going to walk through that because, first of all, it’s not true,” he commented. “And the truth, at the end of the day, still reigns supreme.”
The unnamed woman first filed the lawsuit in October 2024 before refiling in December. She alleged that Jay-Z and Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs raped her when she was 13, following the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards. Both artists denied the allegations and the suit was later dismissed in early 2025.
The 99 Problems rapper subsequently filed a defamation lawsuit against the accuser and her lawyers, but it was also dismissed several months later.
