Axl Rose denies allegations as sexual assault lawsuit reaches settlement

The hard rock band Guns N’ Roses‘ vocalist, Axl Rose, has reached a settlement in the November 2023 sexual assault lawsuit against him. Sheila Kennedy, a former Penthouse model, filed the lawsuit, claiming that the incident happened in 1989. Kennedy claimed in her initial lawsuit that Rose had dragged her by the hair from a hotel room next door to his room in New York. According to the lawsuit, Rose then used pantyhose to tie her hands behind her back before forcing her way into her anus. The following was claimed in that litigation.

He treated her like property used solely for his sexual pleasure. He did not use a condom. Kennedy did not consent and felt overpowered. She felt she had no escape or exit and was compelled to acquiesce. She believed Rose would physically attack her, or worse, if she said no or attempted to push him away. She understood that the safest thing to do was to lie in bed and wait for Rose to finish assaulting her.

A few months later, in March of this year, Rose filed a motion to have the lawsuit dismissed, pointing to a line from Kennedy’s 2016 biography as well as contradictory reports of what happened.

In her 2016 self-authored memoir, No One’s Pet, Kennedy described the alleged incident in the Complaint as consensual sex, and specifically noted: ‘I was okay with this. I had wanted to be with him since the minute I’d first laid eyes on him, and now I was getting him.’

She asserted intentional infliction of emotional distress, assault, battery, and gender-motivated violence as causes of action in her lawsuit. For his part, Rose denied that the encounter had happened. According to Rolling Stone, the lawsuit has already been resolved out of court. There was no disclosure of the parameters of that arrangement. But Rose insisted on his innocence in a statement given to the aforementioned publication.

As I have from the beginning, I deny the allegations. There was no assault.

Axl Rose

Mr. Rose has suffered greatly from this lawsuit, and I am pleased that he will now be able to move on with his life.” The settlement finds the case being discontinued with prejudice, meaning it can’t be revived down the line. Furthermore, Rolling Stone note that that the two parties agreed to cover their own legal costs. E. Danya Perry

The lawsuit was brought during the Adult Survivors Act’s brief window last year. Through that program, victims of sexual assault might sue their perpetrators without being prevented from doing so by the usual statute of limitations that applies to such claims.