50 Cent is facing a potential revenge porn lawsuit after a reality TV star accused him of posting an explicit image of her on social media.
On Tuesday attorney Lisa Bloom issued a press release on behalf of her client, Love and Hip Hop: Hollywood star Teairra Mari, accusing her ex-boyfriend Akbar Abdul-Ahad of accessing her Instagram account and posting graphic images from a sex tape online.
The statement from Bloom’s law firm, which specialises in sexual harassment and sexual discrimination, went on to allege that although Mari quickly deleted the images, the In Da Club rapper, 42, reposted one of them to his 18 million followers on the social media site.
Bloom and her client will be holding a press conference in Los Angeles on Thursday to detail any litigation 50 and Abdul-Ahad will face.
According to Mari, the rapper captioned the image “get the strap” – a common tagline he uses on social media. It no longer appears on his Instagram account, which he has now used to respond to the allegations.
The hip-hop star, real name Curtis Jackson III, posted a picture of himself sitting next to Bloom’s mother Gloria Allred, who is also a famed attorney specialising in women’s rights, which he captioned, “Oh Lisa stop, (raised eyebrow smiley) don’t make me tell your mom.”
Mari, a singer-songwriter who was once signed by JAY-Z to Def Jam Records, has appeared in Love & Hip Hop: Hollywood as a member of the main cast since 2014.
If Bloom files a legal complaint against 50, it will not be the first time he has faced a lawsuit over the leaking of a sex tape. In 2015 a judge ordered him to pay Lastonia Leviston around $7 million (£4.7 million) after she accused him of leaking online a sexually explicit clip she made with her then-boyfriend in 2009 as part of a spoof video.
He subsequently filed for bankruptcy listing his debts as $36 million (£28.7 million). 50 is also suing the law firm who represented him in the original sex tape case and is seeking $7 million (£5.2 million) in actual damages and $25 million (£18.8 million) in punitive damages for alleged malpractice.
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