{"id":33483,"date":"2025-07-02T20:31:15","date_gmt":"2025-07-02T20:31:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/33483\/"},"modified":"2025-07-02T20:31:15","modified_gmt":"2025-07-02T20:31:15","slug":"judge-dismisses-jay-zs-defamation-lawsuit-against-houston-attorney-tony-buzbee-houston-public-media","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/33483\/","title":{"rendered":"Judge dismisses Jay-Z\u2019s defamation lawsuit against Houston attorney Tony Buzbee \u2013 Houston Public Media"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\"Tony<\/a><\/p>\n

Michael Minasi \/ KUT<\/p>\n

Tony Buzbee, the lawyer representing Ken Paxton in his Senate impeachment trial, speaks during a press conference on June 7, 2023, at the Texas GOP headquarters in Austin.<\/p>\n

A California judge has dismissed the extortion and defamation lawsuit filed by rapper Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter against Houston lawyer Tony Buzbee. <\/p>\n

“The case was merciless, and as I predicted, it was thrown out,” Buzbee said in a statement to Houston Public Media. “We intend to seek attorney fees.”<\/p>\n

In his ruling Monday, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Mark H. Epstein said he was conflicted about his decision to dismiss the case.<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, Carter’s lawyers filed an appeal to the ruling. Carter’s lawyers did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but told Rolling Stone<\/a> they were disappointed by the ruling and believed it was a misapplication of California’s law. <\/p>\n

“This court has tried to balance these competing values … although the court is not wholly satisfied that this is the outcome that best serves the legislative and constitutional doctrines,” Epstein wrote in his 65-page ruling. “It will be for the Court of Appeal to determine whether the court got it right or wrong. … Stay tuned.” <\/p>\n

Carter filed the lawsuit in November, just a few weeks before Buzbee filed a federal lawsuit in New York<\/a> accusing Carter and Sean “Diddy” Combs of raping a 13-year-old in 2000. That case was dismissed in February after the alleged victim withdrew her lawsuit, according to the Associated Press<\/a>. Carter’s extortion and defamation lawsuit was in response to letters previously sent by the Buzbee law firm warning of possible litigation. <\/p>\n

Buzbee argued that these pre-trial letters were not extortion and were protected under the law. He also asked the court to dismiss the extortion and defamation case under California’s anti-SLAPP law. An anti-SLAPP motion, also known as a special motion to strike, can be used in California to dismiss a case that infringes on free speech.<\/p>\n

In March, Buzbee withdrew<\/a> as an attorney from a lawsuit in New York against Combs, because he was not admitted to practice law in the federal jurisdiction where the case was filed.<\/p>\n

It was one of a flurry of sexual assault lawsuits Buzbee filed against Combs last year as he awaited trial in New York for criminal charges of sex trafficking.<\/p>\n

RELATED: <\/b>Houston lawyer Tony Buzbee representing 120 people in lawsuits against Sean \u2018Diddy’ Combs<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

On Wednesday, Combs was found guilty on two counts<\/a> of transportation to engage in prostitution. A jury found him not guilty on more serious charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking.<\/p>\n

While Buzbee was not involved in Combs\u2019 criminal case, he is still representing clients in civil cases against the entertainer. <\/p>\n

“Our clients were not the focus of the prosecution’s case,” Buzbee said in a statement. “And those issues are not present in our cases. Our cases instead focus on discrete wrongful conduct allegedly committed by Mr. Combs that would be considered state law crimes if proven. Now that this spectacle is over, we look forward to aggressively pursuing these civil cases to obtain justice for these alleged victims.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael Minasi \/ KUT Tony Buzbee, the lawyer representing Ken Paxton in his Senate impeachment trial, speaks during…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":33484,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5130],"tags":[281,27947,4345,8381,425,1571,50,5546,349,27948,358,27949,3187],"class_list":{"0":"post-33483","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-houston","8":"tag-court","9":"tag-defamation-lawsuit","10":"tag-houston","11":"tag-jay-z","12":"tag-local","13":"tag-national","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-pop-culture","16":"tag-sean-diddy-combs","17":"tag-shawn-jay-z-carter","18":"tag-texas","19":"tag-tony-buzbee","20":"tag-tx"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114785542867360261","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}