More than three months after Nicki Minaj and her husband Kenneth Petty were sued for harassment byJennifer Hough, who accused the latter of rape, Petty has made a new public statement on the matter. He claims that his interaction with Hough was consensual and insists that he did not rape her. Court documents obtained by XXL say that “Defendant [Petty] denies that he ever raped Plaintiff [Hough] and Defendant denies all of Plaintiff’s allegations of improper conduct and/or sexual assault.” It continues, “Rather, the sexual encounter between Plaintiff and Defendant was consensual and Plaintiff was a willing participant.”
The document continues, “Petty pled guilty to attempted rape, despite his innocence, because he was a scared 16-year-old kid and was told that his sentence would be 20 years to life if he did not plead guilty to attempted rape.” The 1995 conviction led to the New York State Board of Examiners of Sex Offenders’ decision to designate him as a Level 2 offender. However, in late 2019 he was arrested for failing to register as an offender, a charge he pled guilty to in September of this year. He faces a maximum sentence of ten years in prison and a lifetime of supervised release.
Hough’s attorney Tyrone A. Blackburn issued a response to XXL about Petty’s comments. “A willing participant would not run 20 blocks to school after a sexual encounter and tell the school security/police that she was raped,” Blackburn said. “If Petty believed Ms. Hough was a willing participant he should have never plead guilty to attempted rape.”
Petty’s comments come after a judge ruled that Nicki Minaj would not have to pay a $20 million judgment in the harassment case.
