Soulja Boy testified in his own defense Tuesday at a civil trial in California, telling jurors he “never” assaulted the woman who claims he beat, raped, and held her against her will while she lived with him as a personal assistant starting in 2019.
The rapper, whose real name is DeAndre Cortez Way, vehemently denied the graphic and harrowing testimony that the woman gave March 19 when she first took the stand in the trial now underway in Santa Monica. The woman, who sued under a Jane Doe pseudonym, told jurors that Way allegedly first raped her in a bathroom during a police raid of his home in mid-February 2019. She claimed he went on to regularly beat, berate, and sexually assault her during a tortured, two-year relationship that sometimes involved consensual intimacy.
Way, 34, admitted Tuesday that there was a sexual encounter with the woman when police showed up at the door of his $25,000-a-month rental home to serve the search warrant. But he claimed she consented. “I asked her if she wanted to have sex, and she was engaged in it,” he said. “She didn’t push me or say stop, nothing like that.”
Defense lawyer Rickey Ivie later walked Way through the months that followed Way’s release from jail on July 14, 2019. Way said that after he was locked up for three months on a weapons-related probation violation, he was happy to see Doe and invited her to live with him at a different house as his intimate partner.
“Did you ever hit the plaintiff in the mouth, bust her lip, and force her to give you oral sex?” Ivie asked on the 10th day of the trial.
“Of course not, and that’s a disgusting allegation,” Way responded. “It sounds crazy to me. I did not do that.”
Way started his testimony briefly last week when he was called by the Jane Doe as a hostile witness. He gave mostly one-word answers during that examination by Dean Aynechi, a partner at West Coast Trial Lawyers. Asked last week if he hired the woman to be his personal assistant, Way said no, she was never his employee. Aynechi then confronted Way with a video that showed him shopping on Rodeo Drive in late January 2019 and calling out for his “assistant.”
“You started yelling, ‘Where’s [Doe]? Where’s my assistant?’ And she ran up behind you with your bag, with your shopping,” Aynechi said. Asked if that accurately described the video, Way said, “Yes.”
On Tuesday, Ivie asked Way why he called the woman his assistant in public that day. Way claimed it was because he met her through a mutual friend that same month and had offered her free room and board in exchange for her services “rolling weed.”
“We were in a public setting, and I didn’t want to refer to her as ‘blunt roller’ with cameras and people around,” Way said of the Rodeo Drive video. “I thought it more appropriate to call her ‘assistant.’”
During Way’s first turn on the stand last week, Aynechi bombarded the rapper with text messages allegedly showing the woman regularly made purchases for Way in her capacity as his personal assistant. In one text exchange, Way berated the woman after he missed a flight. The woman responded by sending Way screen shots of an apparently new airline boarding pass.
Testifying Tuesday, Way claimed the woman was living in his home “rent-free” and sometimes offered to do things for him, voluntarily. The Jane Doe broke down crying as Way denied ever sexually assaulting her. In her prior testimony regarding the February 2019 police raid, she told jurors that she was in the bathroom with Way when he allegedly spun her around, pulled down her pants, and “started having sex” with her as she froze “in shock.” She said she didn’t report the incident to the Ventura County sheriff’s deputies who raided the home because she was “terrified” of Way and his possible retaliation.
“I feared for my life,” Doe told the jury on the fourth day of the civil trial. She claimed Way told her he knew where her mother lived and had threatened to “send shooters” to the house. “I was scared of what he would do to my family. I didn’t want him to hurt anybody because of me,” she testified.
As she wiped tears, the woman claimed Way called her cruel names, withheld meals, locked her in rooms, and would spit on the floor just to watch her clean it up. Doe alleged she was so desperate for food at one point, she begged gardeners to bring her instant noodles. She dropped from 140 pounds down to 86 pounds, she testified. “I didn’t even feel human anymore. I felt like an animal,” she said. “I wanted to die. I didn’t want to be there anymore. I just wanted to go home.”
The woman reported her alleged abuse to police in December 2020. Prosecutors in the Ventura County District Attorney’s Office declined to file any criminal charges. “In April 2021, after a thorough review of the investigation conducted by Ventura County Sheriff’s Office detectives, the Ventura County District Attorney’s Office declined to file charges due to insufficient evidence to prove the alleged crimes true beyond a reasonable doubt,” a D.A. spokesperson told Rolling Stone.
The current trial started March 13 and is expected to reach closing arguments by Thursday. Doe, who filed her underlying lawsuit in January 2021, is suing Way with claims he subjected her to sexual battery, assault, false imprisonment, emotional distress, unpaid overtime, and a hostile work environment. She claims Way punched her in the head on at least 10 separate occasions. The woman alleges one incident was so brutal that she lost consciousness and woke up in a locked room with no food or water.
Way, who shot to worldwide fame with his 2007 viral hit “Crank That (Soulja Boy),” has also been accused of physical and sexual assault by former girlfriends Kayla Myers and model Nia Riley, the daughter of musician Teddy Riley. Way appeared on the reality shows Love & Hip Hop: Hollywood and Marriage Boot Camp with Riley.
In 2021, Riley sat down with YouTube gossip vlogger TashaK and claimed Way threatened her with a gun and kicked her in the stomach while she was pregnant, causing her to suffer a miscarriage. A lawsuit filed by a Jane Doe in May 2021 mirrors the allegations made publicly by Riley. That case resulted in a default judgment that Way is now disputing.
In a separate lawsuit, Myers claimed she had a romantic relationship with Way that ended when the rapper allegedly held a gun to her head, threatened her life, and assaulted her at his home on Feb. 1, 2019. A civil court jury found Way liable for the assault and kidnapping of Myers at a trial.