FKA twigs Shares Details on Alleged Sexual and Physical Abuse by Shia LaBeouf
“I think he felt like he was losing control of me, and I was trying to get out.”
UPDATE (February 19, 2021): Back in December 2020, FKA twigs filed a lawsuit against Shia LaBeouf, who allegedly abused her sexually, physically and emotionally. Earlier this week, the British singer shared details about her experience with Gayle King on CBS This Morning.
Towards the beginning of their relationship, LaBeouf would “jump over the fence” where she was staying and “leave flowers outside [her] door and poems and books.” Initially, FKA twigs found his gestures “very romantic.” Over time, she realized he was “testing [her] boundaries” and found his ways “inappropriate.”
“His behavior became gradually more and more abusive,” she told King. “Some of the worst times I experienced in that relationship were when I think he felt like he was losing control of me and I was trying to get out,” she added. The artist shared that LeBeouf eventually became physical — the actor would push her and then accuse her of falling down.
FKA twigs went on to recount a trip the two took for Valentine’s Day, which turned out to be one of the worst long weekends of her life. “It resulted in him speeding down the motorway and saying that if I left him…that he would smash the car,” she said. “I thought, wow, he needs so much control over me that he would rather kill us both,” she reflected. She told King that he choked her in public later that evening.
In recent e-mails to The New York Times, LeBeouf claimed that “many of these allegations are not true.”
ORIGINAL STORY (December 11, 2020): FKA twigs has filed a lawsuit against Shia LaBeouf, alleging the actor sexually, physically and emotionally abused her throughout their nearly year-long relationship. The musician spoke about her experiences to The New York Times, stating that she wants to “raise awareness on the tactics that abusers use to control you and take away your agency.”
FKA twigs, whose legal name is Tahliah Debrett Barnett, described several disturbing instances with LaBeouf, including one that took place just after Valentine’s Day in 2019. The two were driving to Los Angeles when LaBeouf unbuckled his seatbelt and threatened to crash the car unless she professed her love for him. After Barnett begged to be let out, LaBeouf pulled over at a gas station. He then threw Barnett against the car and screamed in her face after she tried to remove her bags from the trunk.
In her lawsuit, Barnett says the gas station incident occurred in public, yet no one stepped in to intervene. She began to lose hope that anyone would take her abuse seriously. “I just thought to myself, no one is ever going to believe me,” she told the Times. “I’m unconventional. And I’m a person of color who is a female.” The suit also contains accounts from LaBeouf’s ex-girlfriend Karolyn Pho, who endured similar abuse.
Barnett, who will donate a portion of potential monetary damages from the lawsuit to domestic violence charities, spoke about the ways in which an abusive relationship can break down someone who has the resources to leave. ”The whole time I was with him, I could have bought myself a business-flight plane ticket back to my four-story townhouse in Hackney,” she said. “He brought me so low, below myself, that the idea of leaving him and having to work myself back up just seemed impossible.”
Read the full report on FKA twigs’ lawsuit at The New York Times website.
