Jay-Z Rape Accuser Recants Claims

A woman who accused Shawn "Jay-Z" Carter of raping her when she was 13 has formally recanted her allegations, stating she has never met the rapper. The woman, who had filed a lawsuit in 2024 under the pseudonym Jane Doe, claimed she had been drugged and sexually assaulted by Carter and Sean "Diddy" Combs at a party following the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards.

In a statement filed as part of a defamation case brought by Carter against her and her lawyers, Jane Doe declared, "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 further stated that her claims regarding Carter and Combs, as well as a third unnamed celebrity, were false and that "there is no truth to any of my claims against Mr Carter."

Carter had vehemently denied the accusations, characterizing them as a "blackmail attempt" and "frivolous, fictitious and appalling allegations." Following the recantation, he stated, "The trauma that my wife, my children, loved ones and I have endured can never be dismissed."

The woman has been removed from Carter's lawsuit. She asserted that she received no payment from Carter or his representatives for her recantation and had not been compensated to make her new declaration. However, Carter's lawsuit against the woman's former lawyers, led by Tony Buzbee, is ongoing.

According to the woman's statement, her allegations were triggered by a Facebook advertisement in late 2024 seeking individuals with sexual assault claims against Combs. She stated that she was contacted by a law firm but did not review a draft of the lawsuit containing her allegations or authorize its filing in October 2024. She also claimed that Buzbee and other lawyers filed the suit "without conducting any independent investigation, background inquiry, or due diligence, and without obtaining any corroboration of the allegations."

Buzbee, who represents other accusers of Combs, told Rolling Stone, which first reported the recantation, that he had not yet seen the new declaration. He noted that the woman had provided the same story to multiple lawyers before meeting him and that any claim of lying to the court would be new information.

In February 2025, after Carter filed his lawsuit, Buzbee had alleged that Carter's investigators had attempted to intimidate the woman into retracting her story. However, in her recent declaration, the woman stated, "I never received any threat from Mr Carter or anyone acting on his behalf."

Combs denied Jane Doe's initial claims, with his lawyer calling them part of a pattern of civil cases "pushed forward by an attorney more focused on media headlines than legal merit." Combs was convicted in July 2025 on prostitution-related charges and is currently serving a four-year prison sentence.