A sexual assaul lawsuit filed against Marilyn Manson earlier this year has been dismissed because too much time has passed since the alleged incidents – but the case is not necessarily over.
Los Angeles County Superior Court judge Gregory Keosian gave the plaintiff, identified only as Jane Doe, 20 days to amend and re-file her lawsuit.
In her statement of claim, filed in May, the former girlfriend of Manson alleged that he raped and threatened to kill her in 2011. She said she repressed her memories of the alleged incident until February 2021 when other women publicly accused the rocker of sexual assault.
Manson’s lawyer wanted the case thrown out because it went beyond the statute of limitations.
Keosian ruled that the woman’s claims of repressed memory “are not sufficient to invoke the delayed discovery rule.”
“A plaintiff seeking the benefit of the delayed discovery rule ‘must specifically plead facts’ showing the manner of discovery and the inability to have discovered facts earlier,” he ruled.
“The complaint alleges neither when the repression began – such as immediately after the events took place, or outside the limitations period – nor its nature or extent, such as what memories were repressed or the extent to which Plaintiff was prevented from recalling them.”
Lawyers for Jane Doe have said they will file an amended complaint.
Marilyn Manson: iHeartRadio.ca Music News Coverage
Manson is also facing lawsuits from other women, including Esmé Bianco and Ashley Walters.
Manson, through his lawyer, has called the allegations against him “untrue” and part of a “coordinated attack” by women who are “cynically and dishonestly seeking to monetize and exploit the #MeToo movement.” He claimed the women “spent months plotting, workshopping, and fine-tuning” their “twisted tales.”
Manson claims his accusers are conflating his stage persona with “fabricated accounts of abuse.”
After ex-fiancée Evan Rachel Wood went public with allegations of abuse, Manson said on social media: “Obviously, my art and my life have long been magnets for controversy, but these recent claims about me are horrible distortions of reality. My intimate relationships have always been entirely consensual with like-minded partners.
“Regardless of how – and why – others are now choosing to misrepresent the past, that is the truth.”