The woman accusing Garth Brooks of sexual assault has condemned him for publicly releasing her name as he seeks compensation and punitive damages off the back of her claims.
In a statement provided to Us Weekly on Tuesday, October 8, the accuser’s legal team said Brooks, 62, “just revealed his true self.” The accuser’s statement arrived within hours of Brooks filing a complaint that claimed the accuser leaked Brooks’ name in an alleged attempt to “shakedown” the singer. Brooks filed the complaint “to preserve his reputation [and] establish the truth.”
“Garth Brooks just revealed his true self. Out of spite and to punish, he publicly named a rape victim,” the statement, provided to Us by Douglas H. Wigdor, Jeanne M. Christensen and Hayley Baker, read. “With no legal justification, Brooks outed her because he thinks the laws don’t apply to him. On behalf of our client, we will be moving for maximum sanctions against him immediately.”
Brooks’ complaint, filed with the District Court for the Southern District of Mississippi Northern Division on Tuesday and obtained by Us, details the country singer’s claims that his name went public while he was waiting for a judge to sign off on his own filing in which he would use a pseudonym for both parties.
The filing from Brooks, as “John Doe,” read, “When Jane Roe threatened to publish lies about him — intending to blackmail Plaintiff into paying her millions of dollars — Plaintiff filed this lawsuit to preserve his reputation, establish the truth, and put a stop to her scheme. For the sake of his family, and out of respect for Roe’s family as well, Plaintiff titled this action ‘John Doe vs. Jane Roe.’”
Brooks’ filing also alleged that his accuser gave the court “fewer than 48 hours after filing her opposition before publicly leaking Plaintiff’s identity to the press.” As a result, Brooks’ attorneys said his pseudonym filing was “moot” and he would refile his complaint using both of their names.
In a secondary filing submitted on Tuesday, Brooks identified himself and his accuser by name, claiming that she accused him of sexual assault after he would not agree to her “demands for salaried employment and medical benefits.”
Brooks claimed that his accuser “threatened” in a July 17 letter to “publicly file” her “fabricated allegations” unless he “agreed to pay Defendant millions of dollars not to file the suit.” (Her letter allegedly came as a result of “ financial difficulties” she incurred when she relocated to Mississippi, according to Brooks’ filing.)
In an alleged follow-up letter, the accuser “offered to refrain from publicly filing her false and defamatory lawsuit against Plaintiff in exchange for a multi-million dollar payment,” per the documents.
Brooks maintained that allegations made against him by the accuser, a former hair stylist who worked for Brooks in 2019, are “not true.” He also requested to be awarded with “compensatory damages,” caused by the accuser’s “intentional infliction of emotional distress, defamation, and false light invasion of privacy,” as well as “punitive damages in an amount sufficient to deter similar future behavior.”
Brooks was named in a Thursday, October 3, complaint that alleged he raped an anonymous woman in 2019 while she was working for him as a hair stylist. (CNN broke the news initially.)
In the lawsuit, which was obtained by Us, the accuser alleged that she began working for Brooks in 2017 after working for his wife, Trisha Yearwood. The accuser claimed that Brooks sent her sexually explicit text messages, repeatedly exposed his genitals in her presence and made “repeated remarks” about “having a threesome” with Yearwood, 60.
In the weeks prior to the October 3 filing, Brooks filed his own complaint that alleged the accuser was attempting to extort and defame him with “false allegations.”
“The defendant’s allegations are not true,” Brooks’ initial filing read. “Defendant is well aware, however, of the substantial, irreparable damage such false allegations would do to Plaintiff’s 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 that would result if she made good on her threat to ‘publicly file’ her fabricated lawsuit.”
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