money Backstreet Boys’ Nick Carter accused of raping woman after 2001 concert
A woman accused Backstreet Boys’ Nick Carter of raping her at a concert in Washington State two decades ago, when she was 17, according to a lawsuit filed Thursday.
According to the suit, which was filed in Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, where Carter lives, the pop star allegedly gave the woman HPV and threatened her with jail if she revealed what happened.
He used a slur to describe the woman’s disability — she has autism and cerebral palsy — and said that no one would believe her, the suit alleges.
“He also said he’d turn people against me because he’s Nick Carter and he would wreck my life,” the woman is quoted as saying in a news release from her lawyer, Mark Boskovich.
In a statement, Michael Holtz, an attorney for Carter, called the allegations “legally meritless” and “entirely untrue.”
Holtz said the woman had been “manipulated into making false allegations about Nick — and those allegations have changed repeatedly and materially over time. No one should be fooled by a press stunt orchestrated by an opportunistic lawyer — there is nothing to this claim whatsoever, which we have no doubt the courts will quickly realize.”
According to the suit, Carter, then 21, allegedly invited the woman to the group’s tour bus after a show in Tacoma, Washington, in February 2001.
After joining him, she said he provided her with what appeared to be an alcoholic drink, according to the suit. In the bus’ bathroom, he allegedly forced her to perform oral sex and demanded that she stop crying after she erupted in tears, the suit alleges.
Carter raped her a second time on a bed near the back of the tour bus while she begged him to stop, the suit alleges. At the time, she was a virgin, according to the suit.
The woman feared reporting the incident because of Carter’s alleged threats, and in the following years she struggled with self-harm and self-doubt, according to the news release.
“I am getting better and I am ready to seek justice,” she said in the release.
The suit is seeking more than $30,000 in compensatory and punitive damages.
This story first appeared on NBCNews.com.
This article was originally published on TODAY.com
