Nicki Minaj finds herself on the precipice of losing her luxurious $20 million Hidden Hills estate.
According to Rolling Stone, a Los Angeles judge is preparing to authorize the forced sale of the property to satisfy an unpaid judgment stemming from her husband’s alleged backstage assault.
Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Cindy Pánuco delivered the warning during a hearing on Monday, telling attorneys she’s ready to greenlight the property seizure unless the “Super Bass” rapper settles the $503,318 debt owed to German security guard Thomas Weidenmuller.
“My tentative is to grant this,” Judge Pánuco declared from the bench. “I just want to make sure we’re getting it right.”
The legal drama traces back to a 2019 concert in Frankfurt, Germany, where Weidenmuller worked security for Minaj’s performance. According to Weidenmuller’s sworn testimony, Nicki Minaj “became visibly frustrated and blamed the female guard for allowing a fan to breach a barricade and climb on stage with her.”
The situation escalated when Minaj allegedly began “berating the female security guard while recording the exchange.”
The confrontation took a violent turn when Minaj’s husband, Kenneth Petty, allegedly retaliated. Weidenmuller claims
Petty “accused him of disrespecting Minaj and punched him in the face, leaving him stunned and disoriented.” The security guard required emergency hospitalization for 10 days and underwent multiple reconstructive surgeries following the alleged attack.
“I now have five plates in my jaw, and my jaw has not yet been fully reconstructed. The doctors must still insert implants into my jaw as a part of the reconstruction process. In the interim, the doctors have inserted donor bones from a deceased person into my mouth to preserve space for the future implants,” Weidenmuller said.
Weidenmuller filed his lawsuit in January 2022, but Minaj and Petty never responded to it. Their silence resulted in a default judgment awarded Friday, with the court trimming Weidenmuller’s original $721,000 demand down to just over $503,000.
Lawyers made “repeated attempts” to serve them with court papers but were unsuccessful, according to court records.
Process servers visited their gated Calabasas community multiple times without making contact, eventually forcing attorneys to publish the summons in a newspaper.
Judge Pánuco’s only remaining concern involves obtaining Bank of America documentation showing exactly how much of Minaj’s $13.3 million mortgage has been paid since she purchased the eight-bedroom mansion in October 2022.
With the property recently appraised at $20 million and carrying a $13,258,000 mortgage lien, court estimates suggest approximately $6 million would remain after paying the debt and Minaj’s $722,151 homestead exemption.
The court said Nicki Minaj is worth an estimated net worth of at least $150 million, making her “highly capable of paying the judgment in full.” Despite this financial capacity, she has “refused to do so despite multiple written requests for payment and levies served upon several of her suspected creditors.”
Weidenmuller’s legal team attempted less drastic collection methods before seeking a sale of the property, but seven “potential garnishees” either claimed they held no accounts for Minaj or failed to respond.
Petty remains embroiled in a separate federal sexual assault lawsuit filed by Jennifer Hough, the woman central to his 1994 attempted rape conviction. Hough alleges Petty “accosted her at a Queens bus stop,” forcing her to a nearby residence “at knifepoint” where he raped her.
Petty served four and a half years in prison following his 1995 conviction for first-degree attempted rape.
Judge Pánuco scheduled a follow-up hearing for January 22 to receive the outstanding Bank of America documentation and enter her final ruling on the forced sale of the mansion.
