Rap star Nicki Minaj and her husband, Kenneth Petty, have been sued by a woman he allegedly tried to rape in 1994.
She alleged the couple had harassed and intimidated her to force her to retract her story.
The attempted rape victim, now 43, claimed Petty attacked her with a knife in Queens, New York, when she was 16.
Back then, he was arrested on suspicion of rape and served four and a half years in prison after pleading guilty to attempted rape.
The victim filed the lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York.
She sued Minaj, 38, claiming that the singer had allegedly offered her $500,000 to drop her story.
The famous rapper has also been accused of contacting the victim’s family and publicly lying about the incident.
Petty was arrested in March 2020 after failing to register as a sex offender in California.
Shortly after, the victim was allegedly contacted by a childhood friend who acted as an intermediary between the two women, the lawsuit says.
The intermediary gave Minaj the woman’s number, and the singer reportedly called her, offering to take her and her family to Los Angeles if she could “help her,” it added.
The Super Bass performer also offered the woman to have her publicist compose a statement where she recants having accused Petty of rape.
But the victim claims to have rejected both offers.
According to the accuser, she told Minaj during a conversation: “I need you to know woman to woman, that this happened.”
But she and her family suffered an “an onslaught of harassing calls and unsolicited visits,” she added.
A few days later, the accuser’s brother allegedly called to tell her that a family member had been contacted by Minaj, who had offered half a million dollars if the victim wrote a letter retracting her rape allegation against her husband.
It was said that the woman was distraught after the call.
Furthermore, she claimed that she had also received an offer of $20,000 in cash, adding that the hip-hop star had vowed to send a “bonus.”
It was a video message to the woman’s daughter for her 16th birthday.
She has faced “severe depression, paranoia, constant moving, harassment and threats” caused by the famous partner and their associates.
The woman, who has been unable to work since May 2020 and lives in isolation in Florida for fear of retaliation, seeks unspecified damages.
Minaj’s legal representatives have not responded to a media request for comment.
