The woman who accused Jay-Z of rape has recanted her allegations, telling a court that her claims against the rapper were false and that she had never met him.
In a filing submitted by lawyers for Shawn Carter, the former accuser said: “Mr Carter never engaged in any inappropriate conduct toward me whatsoever. There is no truth to any of my claims against Mr Carter.”
She also said she had falsely alleged that Carter and Sean “Diddy” Combs raped her while another celebrity watched. The identity of that celebrity was redacted from the filing.
Jay-Z accuser recants rape allegations
The filing forms part of Carter’s malicious prosecution lawsuit against the woman’s former lawyer, Tony Buzbee. The case was filed in New York in February 2025, and Carter’s lawyers said this week they were removing the woman, known as Jane Doe, from the proceedings.
The woman first brought the allegations in December 2024, in a civil lawsuit filed by Buzbee. She claimed Carter and Combs had raped her at a house party after the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards in New York.
Days later, she repeated the allegations in an interview with NBC News. After the broadcaster raised inconsistencies in her account, she said in a subsequent phone interview that she had “made some mistakes”.
The accuser voluntarily dismissed her case with prejudice in a Manhattan federal court in February 2025, meaning it could not be brought again. In a sworn declaration at the time, she said she continued to stand by her allegations and had dropped the case because she feared “intimidation and retaliation from Jay-Z” and his fans.
Carter has denied the allegations and claimed in his lawsuit that they were knowingly false and malicious. He accused the woman and her lawyers of having “launched to extort” him.
At the time, Combs’ lawyers described the civil case as a “shameful money grab”, while Carter’s lawyer Alex Spiro called it a “frivolous case”. Representatives for Carter, Combs, Buzbee and the woman did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Combs is serving a federal prison sentence after being convicted in July 2025 of prostitution-related crimes in a separate case.
