An anonymous woman who accused Jay-Z of sexual assault has fully recanted her allegations.
In late 2024, a woman identified as Jane Doe filed a civil lawsuit against two celebrities, claiming they drugged and raped her at an afterparty for the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards in New York City.
She later amended the complaint to name the men as Jay, real name Shawn Carter, and Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs – with both rappers denying the allegations.
In February 2025, Doe’s lawyers voluntarily dismissed the lawsuit without settlement, though she claimed to have dropped the case out of fear of intimidation.
But in a declaration filed in a Manhattan federal court on Thursday, Doe recanted all allegations and asserted that she had never met Carter before.
“Shawn ‘Jay-Z’ Carter never raped me. I have never met or spoken to Mr. Carter. Mr. Carter never engaged in any inappropriate conduct toward me whatsoever,” she stated in the filing, obtained by Rolling Stone. “There is no truth to any of my claims against Mr. Carter. I understand my false accusations have caused Mr. Carter immense pain, suffering, and damage that can never be fully undone.”
In addition, Doe’s new lawyer, James Blair Newman, Jr., noted that Doe wanted to “sincerely” apologise to Carter and his family, including his wife Beyoncé.
“Our client maintains that she was a victim of sexual assault, but she was entirely mistaken in her allegations identifying Mr. Carter, and those allegations were false,” he commented. “Mr. Carter did not rape her, sexually assault her, engage in any inappropriate conduct towards her, and she has never met him.”
Representatives for Carter have not yet responded to the filing.
However, in an interview for GQ magazine published in April, the music superstar revealed he was “heartbroken” over the case.
“That whole (lawsuit), that s**t took a lot out of me. I was angry. I haven’t been that angry in a long time, uncontrollable anger. You don’t put that on someone-that’s a thing that you better be super sure,” the 56-year-old told the outlet. “I took that really hard. I knew that we were going to walk through that because, first of all, it’s not true. And the truth, at the end of the day, still reigns supreme.”
Meanwhile, Doe has been dismissed as a defendant in Carter’s ongoing malicious-prosecution case against her former lawyer, Tony Buzbee.
