KESHA ON VID: LUKE INNOCENT
Denied own rape claims in 2011
Newly unearthed video shows pop star Kesha clearly contradicting her claims that her producer, songwriter Dr. Luke, drugged and raped her.
The excerpts of the sworn 2011 video deposition by Kesha (left), which was posted online by TMZ on Tuesday, show the “Tik Tok” singer in a Manhattan law office, where she was questioned about her sexual history with Dr. Luke (inset right), whose real name is Lukasz Gottwald.
“Did you ever have an intimate relationship with Gottwald?” a lawyer asks. “No,” Kesha answers. The deposition was tied to a suit against Kesha and Dr. Luke by her former manager, David Sonenberg, who later settled for an undisclosed amount.
The video includes a response in which Kesha, wearing a sleeveless white top with a microphone clipped to it, mentions someone named David.
“I don’t know what my mother told to David,” she says. “I know that I — Dr. Luke never made sexual advances at me, so.”
Kesha, whose full name is Kesha Rose Sebert, is also asked, “Did Dr. Luke ever give you a roofie?” or a daterape tranquilizer. “No,” she replies. The video also shows Kesha’s mom, Pebe Sebert, denying that anyone had ever told her that Dr. Luke “had had a sexual relationship” with Kesha, or that anyone told her he “had slipped Kesha a daterape drug.”
TMZ said it obtained the 1minute, 25second video from “a Luke source who heavily edited snippets of the deposition.”
Also Tuesday, “Girls” creator and star Lena Dunham voiced support for Kesha in an essay posted on her Web site at lennyletter.com. “What’s happening to Kesha highlights the way that the American legal system continues to hurt women by failing to protect them from the men they identify as their abusers,” Dunham wrote.
Other celebs who have publicly sided with Kesha include singers Lady Gaga, Kelly Clarkson, Ariana Grande and Taylor Swift, who on Sunday donated $250,000 toward Kesha’s legal bills. Kesha and Dr. Luke are currently embroiled in court battles in both New York and California, with Kesha claiming that Dr. Luke drugged and raped her at least twice between 2005 and 2008.
Dr. Luke counters that Kesha made up the allegations in a bid to extort her way out of an exclusive, sixalbum recording contract with him and Sony, under which she still owes four records.
Manhattan Supreme Court Justice Shirley Kornreich ruled Friday that Kesha couldn’t break the agreement, prompting Kesha to burst into tears in the courtroom.
Kornreich is expected to rule soon on the validity of Kesha’s sexassault claims.