A civil lawsuit filed by Jennifer Hough against Kenneth Petty, the husband of rapper Nicki Minaj, stems from a 1994 sexual assault for which Petty was convicted and alleges that years later he and others tried to pressure Hough to recant her account.
Hough filed the federal lawsuit in August 2021 in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. The complaint accused Petty and Minaj of witness intimidation, harassment, assault, battery, sexual assault, and sexual harassment, among other claims.
The case is significant because it combines Hough’s allegations about the 1994 assault with claims about conduct decades later. Hough alleges that efforts to persuade her to change her account intensified after Petty faced legal consequences for failing to register as a sex offender in California.
Hough alleged that she was offered money in exchange for signing a statement retracting her account. She also alleged that people associated with Petty and Minaj contacted her and her family and that the pressure escalated into threats. Hough said the experience left her fearful for her safety and forced her to relocate. Those assertions are allegations in the civil lawsuit and have not been established by a jury verdict.
Hough and Petty were teenagers in Queens when, according to court records and Hough’s later accounts, Petty sexually assaulted her in September 1994. Petty was subsequently convicted of attempted rape in New York and served a prison sentence. He is a registered sex offender as a result of that conviction.
Minaj, whose legal name is Onika Tanya Maraj, was initially sued alongside Petty. Hough voluntarily dismissed her from the New York case in January 2022, without prejudice. That meant the dismissal itself did not constitute a judicial finding on the merits of Hough’s allegations against Minaj.
