Backstreet Boys member
Nick Carter is facing new sexual assault allegations in a lawsuit that claims the singer raped a woman on two occasions while they were involved in a relationship in 2005.
In a civil complaint, filed last week in Nevada, and reviewed by
Variety, a woman by the name of Laura Penly accuses Carter of forcing her into sexual acts in 2004 when she was 19 and Carter was 25. She alleges they had consensual sex about three times before Carter became aggressive, and “dismissed” her refusal to have sex, telling her that “the only reason she was there was to have sex.”
Penly claims Carter “failed to use protection” during this altercation and, in turn, failed to prevent the spread of sexually transmitted infections including HPV. She alleges these actions led her to contract cervical cancer later in life.
Elsewhere in the complaint, Penly alleges Carter assaulted her again about two months after the first instance of rape. She says he apologized and asked to see her again, only to isolate her in a bedroom and rape her a second time.
In a statement shared with
Variety, Liane K. Wakayama and Dale Hayes, Jr., attorneys for Carter, said the lawsuit is “just more of the same nonsense from the gang of conspirators and their lawyers who continue to abuse the justice system to try to ruin Nick Carter.”
“It’s drawn from the same predictable playbook – lie in wait for decades until Mr. Carter is celebrating a professional milestone, then hide behind litigation privilege to make utterly false claims in an attempt to inflict maximum damage on Nick and his family.”
They continue, “Nick does not recall ever even meeting Laura Penly. He certainly never had any romantic or sexual relationship with her. Ever. The person making these claims has a documented history of financial and legal trouble, has filed for bankruptcy and has been sued for fraud – and whatever health challenges she may have faced have absolutely nothing to do with Nick. Not only will we fight this, we will be seeking sanctions against her legal team for enabling this frivolous action.”
Carter and his brother Aaron are at the center of a recent two-part documentary that chronicles the latter and late singer’s
rapid rise to fame, along with the impact it had on Nick Carter and their formerly close-knit family. Told from the perspective of the singers’ sister, Angel, the docuseries “unpacks the complicated family dynamics that led to the untimely deaths of three of the original five Carter kids as well as their father,” per a press release.
Penly’s lawsuit is the fourth sexual assault lawsuit in a series of legal complaints filed against Carter. In Dec. 2022, Shannon Ruth filed suit against Carter in Clark County, Nevada, alleging that he forced her to perform oral sex on him after a Backstreet Boys concert in 2001. Carter is also facing allegations from former Dream singer Melissa Schuman. In her lawsuit filed two years ago in California, Schuman alleged Carter drugged and raped her at his Santa Monica apartment in 2003, when she was 17.
