Azealia Banks Files Battery Report Against Russell Crowe
By Amanda Wicks
(RADIO.COM) – Azealia Banks has reportedly filed a battery report against actor Russell Crowe, stating that he used force to remove her from a hotel suite party he hosted over the weekend.
According to TMZ, Banks filed the report with the Beverly Hills Police Department on Sunday (Oct. 16) after Crowe refused to apologize. Banks claimed Crowe choked her, used a racial epithet and spit on her while trying to get her to leave.
The incident occurred at a Beverly Hills hotel where the actor was staying. Banks attended the party as a guest of RZA, who recently signed her and is directing her in a movie. She upset guests at the party by making fun of the music Crowe was playing, and then threatened to smash her glass and cut them with the shards when a female guest told her to be quiet.
Witnesses attending the party offered a different version than Banks would later tell police. They said Crowe didn't react to her threat until she raised her glass, and then stepped in to stop her by putting her in a bear hug and removing her from the suite. Hotel security then escorted her off the property.
Banks' manager tweeted a statement on the rapper's behalf early Monday morning (Oct. 17). "Azealia is tremendously distraught and disheartened," he wrote. "She is shell shocked and will speak out on the incident once she has had time to process the brutality and abuse she was unjustly subjected to." Banks also took to social media early Monday with a brief, ambiguous statement of her own. "I have receipts. Stay tuned," she tweeted.
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