Nicki Minaj says her delay in responding to Jennifer Hough’s lawsuit is all a misunderstanding after news circulated that Hough could receive a default judgment in her suit against the rapper and her husband.
Hough is the rape victim of Minaj’s husband, Kenneth Petty. He was convicted of the assault in 1995 and served several years in prison, registering as a sex offender every since his release. Hough is suing the Pettys for harassment, claiming they have intimidated and stalked her and her family in an effort to make her recant the rape claims. Hough and her attorney, Tyrone Blackburn, appeared on The Real last month to detail how the couple offered her money to take back her account, which she did not accept.
Last week, the news broke that the Petty’s had not responded to Hough’s lawsuit, which could lead to a $20 million default judgment. Minaj responded in court documents dated October 15th, claiming that her lack of response to the suit was not done purposefully. The docs explain that the “Super Bass” star held a Zoom meeting with a potential lawyer, Judd Burstein, on September 23rd. Minaj believed that the two agreed on him representing her. However, on October 12th, the hip-hop icon learned that there had been some miscommunication, and her manager didn’t realize Minaj had agreed to hire Burstein, causing the delay. After a brief back and forth, Burstein and Onika sorted out the matter, and he became her lawyer.
Minaj called the delay “an innocent mistake” and requested that the court excuse it so that she could properly defend herself from the “entirely frivolous case.”
Burstein is already hard at work on having the case dismissed altogether, citing several reasons; one of which claims that a process server lied about who they served a copy of the summons and complaint to at Minaj’s home.
