Trey Songz has reached a confidential settlement to end a lawsuit claiming he sexually assaulted a woman at a Miami nightclub on New Year’s Eve in 2018.
The R&B singer (Tremaine Neverson) was facing assault and battery claims from Jauhara Jeffries, who alleges Songz non-consensually penetrated her with his fingers while they were dancing at E11even Miami in the early hours of Jan. 1, 2018. Songz denied ever assaulting Jeffries.
The pair had been gearing up to go to trial next month alongside E11even Miami, which was accused in Jeffries’ lawsuit of negligently serving alcohol to Songz despite his public history of substance abuse. But new docket entries in Florida court say Jeffries, Songz and the club have all reached a settlement to end the litigation.
“This court has been advised that the matter has been settled as to all parties and therefore, it is hereby ordered and adjudged that this case is dismissed,” wrote Judge Antonio Arzola on Tuesday (Sept. 9). “The court reserves jurisdiction to enforce the settlement and to enter orders necessary to this enforcement.”
The terms of the settlement have not been made public, as is typical for out-of-court resolutions. Jeffries’ lawyer, Ariel Mitchell, tells Billboard on Wednesday (Sept. 10), “I can only comment that the matter has been resolved.”
Reps for Songz and E11even Miami did not immediately return requests for comment.
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Songz has faced numerous allegations of sexual misconduct over the years. The singer previously settled claims that he assaulted a woman at a Los Angeles house party in 2016, and he’s set to go to trial next year over a separate Las Vegas incident from 2021.
Jeffries first filed her lawsuit in 2020, and it had been scheduled to go to trial in Miami this October before a settlement was reached. The case had been muddled by allegations from Songz’s legal team that Mitchell, Jeffries’ attorney, attempted to bribe a witness into backing her client’s version of the events at E11even Miami.
Mitchell has strongly denied these claims, and Judge Arzola ultimately declined to issue penalties earlier this year after finding that there wasn’t conclusive evidence of bribery in what amounted to a “classic ‘she-said versus she-said’ scenario.”
However, Mitchell is facing disciplinary action from the Florida Bar for falsely telling media outlets, including Billboard, back in 2022, that she’d already been cleared of wrongdoing related to the bribery allegations. In reality, says the Florida Bar, Mitchell was still under investigation at the time of these press comments.
