Nicki Minaj Sues Twitter User She Says Called Her a ‘Cokehead’
Months after Cardi B won a $4 million verdict over social media gossip, Minaj takes aim at an account that she says is "spreading lies" about her.
Nicki Minaj is suing a social media persona called “Nosey Heaux” for defamation over a viral video on Twitter in which the account allegedly called the rapper a “cokehead.”
In a complaint filed Wednesday in New York federal court, Minaj’s attorneys claimed that a woman named Marley Green was behind the @noseyheauxlive account – and that she had “outrageously defamed” the rapper with a video this week claiming she was “shoving all this cocaine up her nose.”
Attorneys for Minaj (real name Onika Tanya Maraj) said Green was just a “nobody” who was spreading “lies” about the star, but that social media had allowed her claims to “metastasize” as they were retweeted and liked by thousands of other users.
“In a different age, Green’s lie would have been meaningless,” Minaj’s lawyers wrote. “While social media is an extraordinarily effective vehicle for spreading lies,” they added,” it does not confer a license to do so.”
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According to the lawsuit, the Nosey Heaux account on Twitter posted the video on Monday (Sept. 12). In it, Green allegedly stated that Minaj was “shoving all this cocaine, shoving in all this cocaine up her nose. Allegedly. Thank you. Allegedly. But we all know it’s true. Fuck—listen, I can’t even say allegedly with that ‘cause I—we know it’s true. I’m not saying allegedly on that. Nicki Minaj is a coke head.”
In a tweet Wednesday morning after news of the lawsuit broke, the @noseyheauxlive account tweeted that Minaj had “lied.” In another tweet days earlier, the account said: “I stand by wtf I said @NICKIMINAJ WAS ON INSTAGRAM WITH COCAINE RUNNING OUT OF HER NOSE.”
In a statement to Billboard, Minaj’s attorney Judd Burstein said: “Marley Green is a disgrace — someone so lacking in fundamental decency that she has posted vile comments about Nicki’s one year-old son. When this case is over, she will no longer be permitted to use the name ‘Nosey Heaux’ because we will take her trademark from her when she does not have enough money to pay the judgment.”
Responding to Wednesday’s defamation accusations, Green’s attorney Bobby Samini told Billboard in his own statement that Minaj’s lawsuit was “an act of retaliation,” filed after Green hosted a woman named Jennifer Hough on her YouTube channel.
Last year, Hough sued Minaj and her husband Kenneth Petty, alleging the couple had harassed and intimidated her into staying quiet about being the victim at the center of Petty’s 1995 conviction on attempted rape charges. Minaj was later dropped from the case, but Hough’s lawsuit is still pending against Petty.
“Curiously, Ms. Minaj’s lawsuit was filed shortly after Ms. Hough’s interview with Marley,” Samini said in the statement to Billboard, noting that his client was a rape survivor. “Since the interview, Marley has received threats of physical violence and constant harassment. There is no doubt that this will backfire for Ms. Minaj once the public learns about the intimidation and harassment that Marley has suffered — all as a direct result of her mission to give other sexual assault survivors a voice.”
Minaj’s new lawsuit echoes a similar case filed by Cardi B against a YouTuber who made claims on social media about drug use and other illicit behavior by the star. Following a trial earlier this year, Cardi B won a $4 million verdict after jurors said the woman had defamed the rapper.
Read Nicki’s entire lawsuit here:
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