Garth Brooks has been accused of rape, sexual assault and sexual abuse in a lawsuit filed Oct. 3 by a hairstylist/makeup artist who worked for him.
The country music star, 62, responded to the allegations filed by plaintiff “Jane Roe” in a statement to Yahoo Entertainment, saying that he’s “not the man they have painted me to be.”
In September, Brooks anonymously filed a lawsuit against the accuser, alleging attempted extortion and defamation.
Hours after Roe’s lawsuit was filed on Thursday, Brooks took the stage in Las Vegas and referenced his personal troubles in a social media post.
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On Oct. 3, the former employee filed a lawsuit against him in the California Supreme Court in Los Angeles County. In the complaint, Roe, who said she began working with Brooks in 2017, alleged he raped her, groped her, made unwanted sexual remarks, undressed in her presence and sent her sexually explicit text messages throughout 2019.
Roe — who first worked with Brooks’s wife, Trisha Yearwood, beginning in 1999 — claimed Brooks made repeated remarks about having “threesomes” with her and Yearwood. She alleged Yearwood overheard the explicit comment “on at least one occasion.” Roe said she stopped working for Brooks and moved to Mississippi around May 2021.
Brooks denied Roe’s allegations in a statement.
“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,” Brooks said. “It has been like having a loaded gun waved in my face. Hush money, no matter how much or how little, is still hush money. In my mind, that means I am admitting to behavior I am incapable of — ugly acts no human should ever do to another.”
It continued, “We filed suit against this person nearly a month ago to speak out against extortion and defamation of character. We filed it anonymously for the sake of families on both sides.”
The statement concluded, “I trust the system, I do not fear the truth, and I am not the man they have painted me to be.”
A rep for Yearwood has not responded to Yahoo Entertainment’s request for comment.
Roe’s allegations against Brooks
The makeup and hair professional said that in 2019, Brooks found out she was experiencing “financial difficulties” and hired her more regularly, according to her complaint.
That year, Roe was prepared to do his hair and makeup when Brooks came from the shower “naked, with an erection” and placed her hands on his genitals, according to her lawsuit. She said she refused his request to “perform oral sex on him.”
In May 2019, Roe traveled with Brooks to Los Angeles for a taping of a Grammys tribute to Sam Moore. She said she was surprised when they were the only two passengers on Brooks’s private plane because usually more members of his team were present. At their hotel, she said Brooks “booked a hotel suite with one bedroom” and “she did not have a separate room.” She claimed that is where she was raped, feeling “trapped” and unable to “escape his physical domination.”
Roe claimed that after the alleged sexual assault, Brooks “increased the frequency of saying his sexual fantasies about her aloud” and groped her breasts when she was working on his hair and makeup. She said he also sent her sexually explicit texts and later took her phone and deleted messages he sent her.
She claimed Brooks attempted to rape her in October 2019 but had to leave for another engagement.
“We applaud our client’s courage in moving forward with her complaint against Garth Brooks,” Roe’s attorneys, Douglas Wigdor and Hayley Baker, told ABC News in a statement. They said the lawsuit “demonstrates that sexual predators exist not only in corporate America, Hollywood and in the rap and rock and roll industries but also in the world of country music.”
It continued, “We are confident that Brooks will be held accountable for his actions and his efforts to silence our client through the filing of a preemptive complaint in Mississippi was nothing other than an act of desperation and attempted intimidation. We encourage others who may have been victimized to contact us as no survivor should suffer in silence.”
Brooks sued Roe to block her lawsuit
In Roe’s lawsuit, it’s noted that Brooks filed a lawsuit — using the pseudonym John Doe — against her (as Jane Roe) on Sept. 13 in the Southern District of Mississippi Northern Division Court.
In the complaint, obtained by Yahoo Entertainment, Brooks’s legal team said the lawsuit was being filed to “obtain relief from Defendant’s ongoing attempted extortion, defamation, false light invasion of privacy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress through outrageous conduct including the publication and threatened wider publication of false allegations of sexual misconduct that would irreparably harm [Brooks’s] reputation, family, career and livelihood.”
Brooks, who asked for a jury trial, said in his lawsuit that Roe’s “allegations are not true.”
He said he hired her “out of loyalty, friendship, and a desire to improve” her personal situation, but her demands for “financial assistance” only increased, according to his complaint. He said when he denied her a salaried position with medical benefits, “she responded with false and outrageous allegations of sexual misconduct.”
Brooks’s lawsuit states he first heard of Roe’s sexual assault allegations — “none of which has any basis in fact” — in a July 17 letter her lawyers sent threatening a lawsuit. Brooks’s attorneys received a follow-up letter on Aug. 23 saying Roe would “refrain from publicly filing her false and defamatory lawsuit against” him “in exchange for a multi-million dollar payment.”
Brooks, who seeks compensatory and punitive damages, says Roe knows her “false allegations” will cause “substantial, irreparable damage” to his “well-earned reputation as a decent and caring person, along with the unavoidable damage to his family and the irreparable damage to his career and livelihood.”
Brooks took the stage in Las Vegas hours after lawsuit was filed
Despite the lawsuit — and headlines — Brooks took the stage Thursday for his sold-out residency performance at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace.
After the show, he shared an emotional post on Instagram, thanking his fans for getting him through the show.
“If there was ever a night that I really needed this, TONIGHT was that night! Thank you for my life!!!!! love, g,” he wrote.
If you or someone you know has been sexually assaulted, help is available. RAINN’s National Sexual Assault Hotline is here for survivors 24/7 with free, anonymous help. 800-656-HOPE (4673) and online.rainn.org.
