Garth Brooks is accused of sexual assault and battery in a hair and makeup artist's lawsuit

CNN
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Country star Garth Brooks has been accused of sexual assault and assault in a lawsuit filed by “Jane Roe,” who says she worked as a hairdresser and makeup artist for the award-winning singer.

The lawsuit, filed Thursday in state court in California and obtained by CNN, says the alleged incidents occurred in 2019. She claims she was once raped by Brooks during a business trip.

Brooks had previously denied his accuser's claims, although representatives for the country superstar did not immediately respond to CNN's request for comment on Roe's new lawsuit.

Prior to Roe's filing, and as first reported by CNN, an anonymous prominent plaintiff – now apparently Brooks – had attempted to block Roe from publicly repeating her allegations, strongly denying the claims, according to an earlier complaint he described as ” John had submitted doe.”

According to her lawsuit, Roe began providing hair and makeup services for Brooks in 2017. It states that she was first hired to do hair and makeup for his wife Trisha Yearwood in 1999.

CNN has reached out to Yearwood's representatives for comment.

In addition to sexual assault and battery, the lawsuit accuses Brooks of repeatedly exposing his genitals and buttocks; talking about sex and sharing sexual fantasies with Roe; he regularly changed his clothes before Roe; and sending sexually explicit text messages.

In her filing, Roe alleges that in an alleged incident in 2019, while she was at Brooks' home for work, he walked out of the shower naked, “grabbed her hands and forced them on his genitals” while speaking sexually to her explicit and vulgar language.

In another alleged incident in May 2019, the lawsuit alleges that Brooks raped Roe in a hotel room during a business trip to Los Angeles, where Brooks was recording a Grammy tribute performance.

According to the lawsuit, Brooks and Roe traveled to Los Angeles on Brooks' private jet.

“There were usually others on Brooks' private jet, but this time Ms. Roe and Brooks were the only two passengers,” the complaint states. “When she arrived at the hotel in Los Angeles, Ms. Roe could not believe that Brooks had booked a one-bedroom hotel suite and she did not have a separate room.”

When they arrived at the hotel suite, Roe claimed the country singer “showed up in the bedroom doorway completely naked.” Roe's complaint says she felt “trapped in the room alone with Brooks.”

Roe claims Brooks continued to tell her about his sexual fantasies and physically grope her more frequently after the alleged rape. The complaint says Brooks made “repeated comments” about having “a threesome” with his wife.

In his complaint as Plaintiff John Doe, Brooks claims defendant Roe's attorney sent him a “confidential” demand Letter alleging sexual misconduct after denying Roe's request for “employment and medical benefits.”

“Defendant's allegations are untrue,” Brooks' earlier lawsuit states. “The defendant, however, recognizes the significant, irreparable harm that such false allegations would cause to the plaintiff’s well-deserved reputation as a decent and caring human being, along with the inevitable harm to his family and the irreparable harm to his career and livelihood.” This is what would happen if she followed through on her threat to “publicly file” her fabricated lawsuit.

Roe's lawyers told CNN that Brooks' “attempts to silence our client by filing a preemptive lawsuit in Mississippi were nothing more than an act of desperation and intimidation.”

“We are confident that Brooks will be held accountable for his actions,” attorneys Douglas H. Wigdor, Jeanne M. Christensen and Hayley Baker said in a statement to CNN. “We applaud our client’s courage in moving forward with her complaint against Garth Brooks. “The complaint filed today shows that sexual predators exist not only in corporate America, in Hollywood, and in the rap and rock and roll industries, but also in the world of country music.”

This is a developing story and will be updated.