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Country music star Garth Brooks has filed a motion to dismiss the Oct. 3 sexual assault lawsuit brought against him in California, calling it “duplicative” of a prior lawsuit claiming defamation and extortion that he filed against his accuser in Mississippi in September.
In the new motion filed Friday, Brooks’ lawyers say the California lawsuit mirrors his federal action “already pending between the same parties, arising from the same set of disputed facts, and involving the same overlapping issues.” The lawyers say the Jane Roe accuser “seeks to recover damages for precisely the same alleged assaults that Mr. Brooks’ lawsuit alleges never occurred.” They say federal court rules dictate she should be forced to make her allegations as counterclaims in the “first-filed” case. They say this would promote efficiency for the parties and the court.
In the woman’s graphic lawsuit first filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court and obtained byRolling Stone, the woman — a hair and makeup artist who worked with the singer — said a first alleged battery took place while she was at Brooks’ home on a styling appointment. She claimed Brooks stepped out of a shower naked, “grabbed her hands and forced them onto his erect penis” while stating that he “had fantasized about this moment and wanted her to perform oral sex on him.”
The woman said a second incident happened when she agreed to travel with Brooks to Los Angeles for a Grammy tribute to Sam Moore. She claimed Brooks “trapped” her in a hotel room, “grabbed her hands and pulled her” onto a bed where he allegedly raped her. She claimed that at one point during the alleged assault, Brooks held her upside down by her feet.
In his pre-emptive Sept. 13 lawsuit in Mississippi, Brooks claimed he was the victim of an “ongoing attempted extortion.” He called the woman’s allegations “outrageous” and asked the court to declare they were false. In the new motion to dismiss her claims in California in favor of the Mississippi action, Brooks claims he was the victim of “blackmail.”
“Roe asked Brooks for increasing amounts of financial assistance, which he eventually declined to provide, and she thereafter responded with false and outrageous allegations of sexual misconduct she claims occurred years ago,” the new filing states. “Roe sought to extort Brooks by offering to refrain from publicly filing her false allegations in a lawsuit in exchange for a multimillion-dollar payment,” it claims. In a controversial move, Brooks and his lawyers identified his accuser by name and included photos of her in court filings before the Mississippi-based lawsuit was sealed.
A hearing on Brooks’ request to dismiss the California action and force Jane Roe to file her claims in Mississippi has been set for Dec. 9. Jane Roe’s lawyer did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The push by Brooks resembles one previously attempted by Backstreet Boys member Nick Carter. In that case, Carter sought to dismiss a rape lawsuit filed in California by former Dream singer Melissa Schuman because he already was suing her for defamation in Nevada. A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge sided with Schuman on the venue matter, finding that because Schuman’s alleged assault purportedly happened in Santa Monica, Calif., it had links to local police, local witnesses and the law enforcement interests of local citizens.
Both the Brooks and Carter cases involve alleged violations of state law. Brooks successfully transferred the sexual assault lawsuit to federal court in California earlier this month on the grounds that he and his accuser live in different states, namely Tennessee and Mississippi. Carter and Schuman, meanwhile, both live in Nevada, so their dispute has remained in state court.
The shift to federal court could be advantageous to Brooks. Federal courts typically schedule quicker trial dates and draw from a larger jury pool that includes residents from more conservative areas outside metropolitan centers. In his Mississippi matter, the case is now sealed, meaning filings are not accessible to the public online.
When Brooks filed his earlier motion to move the sexual assault lawsuit from state to federal court, a lawyer for his accuser was critical of the effort. “This is just more of the same bullying and intimidation Garth Brooks has used from the moment he learned our client intended to hold him accountable.We look forward to getting before a jury and reaching the merits of this case,” lawyer Jeanne M. Christensen said in a statement to Rolling Stone.
Brooks has issued several comments of his own in recent weeks. “For the last two months, I have been hassled to no end with threats, lies, and tragic tales of what my future would be if I did not write a check for many millions of dollars,” the country singer said in a statement toRolling Stone.“It has been like having a loaded gun waved in my face.”
Brooks later added in a Facebook Live Q&A, “This thing is on; it’s gonna happen. People are telling me it could be up to two years. So my suggestion is, we all take a deep breath, just kinda settle in and let’s hold hands and take a trip together. Because it is something that we cannot talk about. That’s all we can say about it.”
This story was updated on Monday, November 11, 2024, with new details from Brooks’ motion to dismiss filed Friday
