FKA twigs says Shia LaBeouf pressured her to "sleep naked" and called her "disgusting" and "vile"
British singer-songwriter FKA twigs is speaking out in her first television interview since filing a civil lawsuit in December against her former boyfriend, actor Shia LaBeouf. The singer — who is also on the cover of the next issue of Elle Magazine — accuses LaBeouf of sexual battery, assault and inflicting emotional distress. He denies the allegations.
She told "CBS This Morning" co-host Gayle King that she filed the lawsuit and is choosing to speak out to help other women in abusive relationships.
"He would often just start having an argument with me in the middle of the night, start accusing me of doing all sorts of things, planning to leave him in my head," FKA twigs said. "He'd wake me up, tell me I was disgusting, that I was vile."
She said nothing LaBeouf accused her of was "ever true."
"But this is the thing — but I would really doubt myself. You know, especially when I'd, like, wake up and he'd be like, 'You were lying there with your eyes open, planning to leave me.' And I'd be like, 'I literally was asleep,'" she said.
She continued, "But then he would, like, only want me to sleep naked because he said if I didn't then I was keeping myself from him."
FKA twigs said that had been "a tactic that a lot of abusers use."
"It's just this, like, constant availability, and everything centered around them," she said. "And I think, you know, that's why I wanted to come out and talk about this. Because the signs really are there from the beginning."
However, she said there was not "one set moment" that made her believe the signs were part of a larger problem.
"It's very subtle. That's the thing about, you know, domestic abuse, domestic violence, that it's a real gradual step-by-step process to get somebody to a place where they lose themselves so much that they accept or feel like they deserve to be treated in that way," she said.
It was not just "one thing," she said, but rather "loads of tiny little things that get sewn together into a nightmare."
In a response to FKA twigs' suit obtained by other media outlets, LaBeouf's lawyers said the actor "denies, generally and specifically, each and every allegation" in the lawsuit.
CBS News reached out to the actor's attorney Shawn Holley, who said "a lawyer issuing general denials to all the allegations in a lawsuit is standard procedure in civil practice and signals nothing about Shia's past statements or his acceptance of responsibility for things he has done wrong. Nothing has changed."
More of Gayle King's interview with FKA twigs will air on "CBS This Morning" on Thursday, February 18.
This story raises issues related to domestic violence. If you need help, or would like to learn more about how to help others, please see the resources below:
- The National Domestic Violence Hotline: 800-799-SAFE or thehotline.org
- The National Coalition Against Domestic Violence: ncadv.org
- U.K.-based charity Sistah Space: sistahspace.org
- Futures Without Violence: futureswithoutviolence.org
- Safe Horizon: safehorizon.org