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News broke last week that rapper Nelly had been accused of sexual assault by a woman with whom he’d allegedly returned to his tour bus after a concert in Seattle-area Washington. Now, the woman is dropping all charges and halting the resulting criminal investigation.
The alleged sexual assault took place early on the morning of Saturday, October 7 after a Friday-night concert at the White River amphitheater. Seattle-Tacoma Fox affiliate Q13 reported at the time that Nelly went into Seattle after the concert and brought the woman back to his bus.
After the alleged rape, Nelly’s lawyer told The Blast that the rapper was “the victim of a completely fabricated allegation,” adding that it was “motivated by greed and vindictiveness.”
On Friday afternoon (October 13), The Blast obtained a letter they report comes from the woman’s attorney. Her lawyer, Karen Koehler, says that her client reached out to the investigating police department and district attorney to halt the criminal investigation. Her client will also not testify any longer in criminal proceedings, the letter says.
According to the letter, Koehler’s client did not “feel safe enough to pursue criminal charges against a celebrity for an alleged rape.” Koehler writes that her client was immediately contacted by journalists as the news broke, subjected to smears from “the celebrity”‘s legal team alleging she was in it for the money, and, later, the detective in charge of investigating shared information pertaining to the case after promising Koehler’s client he wouldn’t.
“She wishes she had not called 911 because the [sic] she believes the system is going to fail her…She wants this to end,” Koehler writes.
She never wanted notoriety. She never wanted a dime from that man. She wants to go back to school and to graduate.”
The letter continues with a reference to Harvey Weinstein and the women who have come out against him: “One day, maybe our world will change and thirty women will not be needed to (eventually) speak out against a celebrity who has hurt them in order to be believed. But that day has not yet come.”
RELATED: Nelly Has Reportedly Been Arrested on Charges of Sexual Assault