Nick Carter's lawyer calls allegations in 'Fallen Idols' documentary series 'scandalous'

Backstreet Boy's lawyer, Nick Carter, has responded to sexual assault allegations featured in a new Investigation Discovery documentary series about the singer and his late brother, Aaron Carter.

In “Fallen Idols: Nick and Aaron Carter,” three women – Ashley Repp, Melissa Schuman Henschel and Shannon “Shay” Ruth – describe alleged assaults in 2001 and 2003 for which they previously sued Nick Carter.

Aaron Carter died in 2022 at age 34.

When asked for comment on the documentary ahead of its broadcast, which will air in two parts Monday and Tuesday, Dale Hayes Jr., Nick Carter's lawyer, told CNN in a statement: “They are exactly the same scandalous claims that led us to pursue this band of conspirators.

The women filed three separate complaints from December 2022 to August 2023. Carter filed two counterclaims in 2023 and 2024, the first against Henschel and Ruth and the second against Repp.

“These cases are currently making their way through the court system and, based on the initial court rulings and the overwhelming evidence, we are confident that we will prevail and hold them accountable for spreading these lies,” said Nick Carter's spokesperson. added the lawyer.

The first two episodes of “Fallen Idols” aired Monday night and explored the stories of Henschel and Repp, as well as the brothers' troubled home lives growing up. The final two installments premiere Tuesday night on ID and will stream on Max. Ruth's story is shared in the fourth episode. (CNN and ID, like Max, are units of Warner Bros. Discovery.)

Nick Carter declined to be interviewed by the filmmakers, according to the documentary.

The accusations

Henschel, a former pop singer with the girl group Dream, accused Nick Carter of using his “role, status and power as a well-known singer to gain access to, groom, manipulate, exploit and abuse her.” sexually assault” in a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles last year, according to a copy of her complaint posted on the “Fallen Idols” web page.

In her lawsuit, Henschel claimed the alleged incident took place in 2003 at Carter's Santa Monica home, when she was 18 years old. The complaint alleged that Carter, who was 22 at the time, performed oral sex on her “against her will” and “forced her.” » Henschel to perform a sexual act on her before raping her. She claims she repeatedly told the singer that “she didn't want to have sex.”

She reiterated these claims in the docuseries and appears throughout all four episodes.

She first raised the allegations against him in a 2017 post on her personal blog. Due to the statute of limitations that expired in 2013, the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office said in a 2018 legal filing that it would not file sexual assault charges against Carter.

In 2022, California passed the Sexual Abuse and Cover Up Accountability Act, which allows adult survivors who meet certain criteria to file lawsuits in cases where the statute of limitations has expired. Henschel sued Carter in April 2023, according to online records. According to an amended complaint filed in October 2023, a copy of which is on the “Fallen Idols” website, Henschel sued Carter for sexual assault, sexual assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress and negligence.

Carter denied the allegations in a statement provided to CNN in 2017, saying, “Melissa never told me while we were together or at any time since that anything we did was not consensual.” We later recorded a song and performed together, and I have always been respectful and supportive of Melissa, both personally and professionally.

“This is the first time I have heard of these accusations, almost two decades later,” he added. “It goes against my nature and everything I hold dear to intentionally cause discomfort or harm to anyone.”

In the second episode of “Fallen Idols,” Repp shares his story.

Repp's lawsuit alleging sexual assault, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligent infliction of emotional distress was filed using only the initials AR in August 2023 and stems from two alleged incidents on Nick Carter's boats in Marathon, Florida, in 2003, when Repp was 15. old.

According to the complaint, Repp accuses Carter of providing her with alcohol “to the extent that she was intoxicated at the time,” knowing she was a minor, and of engaging in sexual acts with her “without her consent”. Repp also alleges that in the second incident, he “encouraged and instigated” his three male friends on the boat to watch him “have sexual intercourse” with her.

Carter, according to the complaint, “continued to have sexual intercourse with AR despite his repeated refusals and requests to stop.” Repp also alleged in the complaint that she contracted a sexually transmitted disease as a result of the incident.

Carter denied Repp's allegations in a countersuit filed in January, according to records available online.

Ruth, who will appear on “Fallen Idols” on Tuesday, filed a sexual battery lawsuit against Carter in December 2022, accusing the singer of raping her on the Backstreet Boys tour bus in 2001 in Tacoma, Washington, then that she was 17 years old.

Carter denied the allegations in a statement provided to CNN at the time by his attorney Michael Holtz, who called Ruth's claims “not only legally baseless, but completely false,” and later filed a counterclaim against Ruth, Henschel and Henschel's father, Jerome Schuman, in 2023.

In his January counterclaim, Carter alleges that Ruth and Repp's “lawsuits are the culmination of an approximately five-year conspiracy orchestrated by co-conspirators to harass, defame and extort Carter,” according to a copy of the complaint published on the “Fallen Idols” website. ” website. “The campaign was launched and supported by the #MeToo movement, from its dawn, when Schuman published a salacious blog post in November 2017, falsely claiming that she had been sexually assaulted by Carter in 2003,” the counterclaim states.

CNN contacted Henschel's attorneys, Ruth and Repp, in addition to representatives of Retrac Inc., doing business as Kaotic Productions, which is also named as a defendant in Schuman's complaint.

All three cases remain ongoing.

For more CNN news and newsletters, create an account at CNN.com