Lawsuit Accuses Kanye West of Drugging and Sexually Assaulting Ex-Assistant

Kanye West‘s former assistant is suing, accusing him of drugging and sexually assaulting her at a studio session co-hosted by the rapper and Sean “Diddy” Combs.

Lauren Pisciotta, who labored for West from 2021 to 2022, alleges in an amended criticism obtained by PEOPLE that West dedicated “sexual battery” after serving her a laced drink. Pisciotta’s allegations are a part of her earlier wrongful termination lawsuit in opposition to West, by which she claimed that she was subjected to express texts, pornographic pictures, movies and telephone calls from him earlier than being fired. She started working with West in July 2021 to help on his Yeezy girls’s vogue line and collaborate on his 2021 album, Donda.

A lawyer for West didn’t instantly reply to PEOPLE’s request for touch upon Saturday, Oct. 12.

A authorized consultant for West beforehand denied Pisciotta’s different allegations made in her preliminary June 2024 criticism to PEOPLE, and added that “Ye might be submitting a lawsuit in opposition to Ms. Pisciotta.”

Per the now-amended criticism obtained by PEOPLE and filed on Oct. 8 in Los Angeles County Courtroom, Pisciotta alleges that earlier than she labored for West, the rapper and producer invited her to a studio session in Santa Monica, Calif., the place “drinks had been served to others in attendance, adopted by an announcement that everyone needed to drink in the event that they needed to remain.”

Based on the go well with, the studio session was co-hosted by West and Combs, and Pisciotta was invited with a “former artist administration consumer.” Whereas Combs is called within the amended criticism because the co-host of the occasion, Pisciotta is just not accusing the previous music mogul — who’s now in jail awaiting his trial for intercourse trafficking and racketeering — of any wrongdoing at the moment.

The submitting additional alleges that Pisciotta’s drink — allegedly served to her by a studio assistant on the request of West — was “laced with an unidentifiable drug,” earlier than she felt disoriented after “just a few small sips.”

“As plaintiff started to slide into an altered and closely impaired state, she felt much less in command of her physique and speech, and that’s the place plaintiff’s reminiscences of that evening escape her,” the criticism reads.

Based on the submitting, Pisciotta awoke the next day “feeling bodily sick and confused” and felt “immense and embarrassment” for not having the ability to recall what occurred after she had the drink, in keeping with the submitting.

For years, West’s former assistant thought she obtained roofied and made a idiot of herself at a piece occasion. A lot later — after West employed Pisciotta to function an assistant and Chief of Employees and do A&R for him — she says the rapper allegedly introduced up the evening in query for the primary time. Throughout the dialog, West instructed Pisciotta that they “did form of hook up slightly one time,” referring to the night within the Santa Monica studio the place the alleged assault passed off.

After Pisciotta allegedly instructed West she had no reminiscence of the studio session, West laughed and instructed her that “girls like to say they do not keep in mind,” per the criticism.

“Up till that very level, proper earlier than that very dialog, Plaintiff was unaware that she had been subjected to gender violence and sexual battery on that studio evening by KANYE WEST a.ok.a YE,” the doc reads.

Based on the amended criticism, Pisciotta allegedly felt “overcome with immense disgrace, discomfort and utter disgust.”

Elsewhere within the criticism, Pisciotta alleged that in July 2021, throughout an “album workshop” on the St. Regis Resort in San Francisco, West “aggressively pounded” on her lodge room door at 6 a.m., woke her up, pressured “his method into her room” and mentioned he wanted to make use of her bathe as a result of his was out of order. Pisciotta alleges that West later approached her and “dropped his towel,” earlier than “he tried to forcefully thrust his bare physique onto and penis into Plaintiff’s face” and “ignored her pleas to cease.” Per the criticism, West “swiftly left” after saying “sorry” and “went about his day as regular.”

The criticism claims that Pisciotta — who has alleged that West despatched her lewd messages and fired her from her Chief of Employees place at his numerous firms a month after she was promoted in September 2022 — “couldn’t abdomen the truth that she labored for the person who had sexually assaulted her in opposition to her will whereas she was drugged, who then efficiently lured her again into his orbit by means of a job alternative to sexually assault her once more.”

West additionally faces a separate lawsuit filed in April 2024 from a former worker who claimed that he suffered “extreme discrimination [and] harassment” whereas working for Yeezy and at his Donda Academy college. A former staffer additionally filed a lawsuit this week on allegations of emotional misery, retaliation and labor code violations.

In case you or somebody you already know has been sexually assaulted, please contact the Nationwide Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-HOPE (4673) or go to rainn.org.