'That is insane': Jury sees texts from Soulja Boy's manager to woman suing for assault
The rapper testified in a civil trial in California that he never imprisoned or assaulted a woman who lived in his home as a marijuana blunt roller.
SANTA MONICA — Nearly two years after she moved into his home in Malibu, a woman now suing rapper DeAndre Cortez “Soulja Boy” Way for assault and sexual battery texted photos of her bruises to his manager.
The woman said she told Michael “M.I.A.M.I Mike” Sykes in a phone call she wanted him to see the photos because “Soulja kept hitting me, and he wouldn’t stop.”
“I felt like if I had M.I.A.M.I Mike talk to him, he would stop beating me every day,” the woman testified recently.
The photos and texts are key evidence in a civil trial that began March 13 before Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Mark Epstein in Santa Monica and is expected to end this week. The claims against Way include assault, sexual battery, false imprisonment, intentional infliction of emotional distress and hostile work environment.
To counter the photos, Way’s lawyers called Sykes as a defense witness, and he denied ever hearing that Way assaulted the woman.
“She was talking to me, but she never did break it down. She never did tell me that Soulja hit her,” testified Sykes, who lives in Mississippi and said he discovered Way when Way was 14 and Sykes was 31 or 32.
“I got five sisters. If she had told me that, I would have definitely got on him. You know what I’m saying?” Sykes continued.
Way’s lawyers highlighted Sykes’ previously unseen text reply to the woman: “Wow. That is insane. I'm so sorry this happened to you.” They entered it into evidence as a defense exhibit, but the woman’s lawyers seized on it in Sykes’ cross-examination to try to persuade jurors Sykes lied when he said he hadn’t heard Way assaulted the woman.
“What were you referring to when you say, ‘I’m so sorry this happened’?” asked the woman’s lawyer Dean Aynechi of West Coast Trial Lawyers.
“The bruises and stuff,” Sykes answered.
“After you said, ‘I’m so sorry this happened,’ were you curious as to what happened?” Aynechi asked.
“I was curious a little. But in my mind, I was just thinking it was from the fight with the girl,” Sykes answered.
Aynechi pointed out that Sykes saw the photos in August 2020, and the fight he referred to occurred in February 2019.
“Would you agree with me that a human would not have bruises on them from February of 2019 in August of 2020?” Aynechi asked.
“I will agree with that, yeah,” Sykes answered.
The woman sued under the pseudonym Jane Doe but is addressed by her true name in court. She spent several days on the witness stand describing how a job as Way’s live-in marijuana blunt roller and personal assistant turned into two years of mental, physical and sexual abuse that included him locking her in her room, threatening to kill her, depriving her of food and beating her if she took too long to fetch him fast food, refused his sexual demands or otherwise bothered him.
She worked for rappers Mally Mall, Lil Twist and Trippie Redd before she met Way. She said they had a verbal employment agreement for $500 a week, but she was paid only the first month, then manipulated with money as he began abusing her more frequently. The woman was emotional while testifying, and she cried at the plaintiff’s table last week during a break in Way’s testimony.
Way is not charged with a crime, but he’s also scheduled for another trial in a similar lawsuit from a former girlfriend who claims years of abuse. In 2023, a jury ordered him to pay a woman $471,900, including $236,000 in punitive damages in another assault and unlawful imprisonment lawsuit.
Way was 14 when he signed with Interscope Records amid rising online popularity that he testified began with MySpace and YouTube. His most popular song, “Crank That,” was released in 2007 on MySpace and spent seven weeks at the top of the Billboard music charts. He later appeared on the reality shows Love & Hip-Hop and Marriage Boot Camp.
In testimony last week, Way denied sexually assaulting the woman, including a rape the woman said occurred while police were searching Way's home in 2019. Way called an allegation that he forced her to perform oral sex “a disgusting allegation.”
“It sounds crazy to me. I did not do that,” Way said.
He testified he always asked the woman if she wanted to have sex before they did so, and he never did anything she didn’t want to do.
“I never had an instance where she told me ‘no’ or she didn’t want to do it, or anything of that nature,” Way testified. “I always would ask her if she wanted to do it, and she always would be 100 percent engaged in that, whether it was her kissing on me or removing her clothes or positioning herself for the sexual intercourse.”
Way testified he asked the woman to be his “blunt roller” after meeting her in January 2019 through a mutual friend but never hired her as an assistant or offered her formal compensation beyond living for free at the home he was renting for $25,000 a month in Malibu. He said she enjoyed accompanying him on trips to the East Coast when he appeared on The Breakfast Club radio show and to Atlanta for when he was honored with a Black Entertainment Television award.
He said he eventually developed romantic feelings for the woman while he was in jail for a probation violation involving a gun between April and July 2019, and he invited her to live with him at his new home in the Bell Canyon area not out of force but because of their intimate relationship.
Jurors saw texts the woman sent him complaining about his communications with other women — she referred to one as a “Big Bird looking bitch” — and his lawyer Rickey Ivie of Ivie McNeill Wyatt Purcell & Diggs asked him about texts he sent her about her not being with him on April 20.
Way testified the day is a highly anticipated “weed holiday,” and “we will always talk about this holiday like, leading up to it.”
“Once 420 came around, she wasn’t there, and we didn’t spend it together. So I felt very emotional about that,” Way testified.
Way acknowledged using foul language in texts such as bitch, so Ivie asked if the language is ”the regular vernacular of the culture of rap?”
“It’s regular vernacular in hip hop and rap,” Way answered.
“Is that language necessarily perceived as offensive?” Ivie asked.
“No,” Way answered. He said he called all his friends, male or female, bitch because “it was a common phrase that we was using.”
The woman said Way boasted of his ties to the Bloods gang, but Way said he claimed affiliation because it can boost album sales or boost streams in certain communities in the hip-hop community.
Ivie likened it to Way claiming he’s from Compton when he’s actually from Mississippi.
“Is that what you mean by it’s entertaining?” Ivie asked.
“Yes,” Way answered.
Way testified about ongoing disputes over his contacts with “other females,” and he said the woman changed her Instagram profile to promote the label of rapper Smokepurpp after she left Way’s home and moved in with him.
“How did you feel about this?” Ivie asked.
“I felt betrayed. I was hurt. I was sad. Things like that,” Way testified.
In cross, Aynechi asked Way about his testimony that he always asked the woman before they had sex.
“So every time you would have sex with her, would you use the same phrase, ‘Do you want to have sex?’” Aynechi asked.
Way said he would ask in different ways.
“But every time you would ask?” Aynechi asked.
“Yeah,” Way answered.
“It was your custom and practice to do so?” Aynechi asked.
“Yeah,” Way answered.
“OK,” Aynechi said incredulously.
Aynechi played a clip from Way’s video deposition in which he said he told the woman “that I loved her, but I wasn’t in love with her.”
“It’s just like you got a dog. I love my dog, but I’m not in love with my dog,” Way said in the deposition.
Ivie followed up in re-direct.
“How are you feeling at this deposition?” Ivie asked.
“I mean, I was feeling hurt. It was definitely a lot, being accused of all these things,” Way answered. “I was going through pain, but I just wasn't trying to show that.”
The woman was watching Way’s deposition online, and he said that made him struggle to express his views.
“Just be accused of all these false things, it just caught me by surprise. It was a lot for me at the time,” Way testified.
“So were you uncomfortable expressing how you felt about her at that time?” Ivie asked.
“Yes,” Way answered.
Sykes testified he never asked Way about the photos of the bruises the woman sent him. He said he was talking to the woman about rapper Megan Thee Stallion because he said she has a crush on Way and he thought they should do a song together.
The woman texted him the photos and he assumed her bruises were from the February 2019 fight between the woman and Kayla Myers, who is the woman who obtained a $471,900 jury verdict against Way in 2023.
“I wasn’t thinking it was Soulja, you know what I’m saying?” Sykes testified.
Aynechi pressed Sykes about his mentioning of Megan to try to show Way’s lawyers brought her up to distract the jury from the photos.
“Are you telling the jury here today that [the woman] got in a fight with Megan Thee Stallion in August of 2020?” Aynechi asked.
“No, sir,” Sykes answered. “I’m just saying I assumed that it was from a fight she got into. But she never needed to tell me exactly what happened.”
“And so Mr. Sykes, as you sit here today, it’s your testimony that you have no knowledge or information about where [the woman] got these bruises?” Aynechi asked.
“No, she never did tell me,” Sykes answered.
“You didn’t ask Mr. Way how she got these bruises?” Aynechi asked.
“Why would I ask him that?” Sykes asked. “We never did speak on him doing it, so why would I even ask him that?”
Aynechi told Sykes the woman testified in trial that she told Sykes “she was assaulted by Mr. Way and that you specifically asked her for the photos.”
“Oh, no, sir,” Sykes answered.
“That didn’t happen?” Aynechi asked.
“No, sir,” Sykes answered.
Closing arguments are scheduled to begin Monday. I’ll be live on YouTube at 6:30 p.m. PT / 9:30 p.m. ET to discuss.
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