JUST IN: Rihanna Opens Up About Horrifying Experience at 16 After Old Viral Video Resurfaces: Jay-Z Kept Her in Diddy’s Room Until 3 A.M., Where Diddy Threatened Her – “Sleep With Me or Climb Out of a 29th-Floor Window” – And What Happened Next Is Even More Terrifying…

After auditioning for Jay-Z and Def Jam chairman Antonio “L.A.” Reid at the label’s offices, she said, she was told that they were “interested.” She went on with a giggle, “Then he said, ‘There are two ways to leave here: either through the door with the deal signed or through this window, and we’re on the 29th floor.’” She told a similar story two years later in a 2007 interview with The Guardian, during which she added that Def Jam “locked me into the office till 3 a.m.” and called the whole experience “very flattering.”

Earlier this month, an anonymous woman accused Jay-Z of raping her when she was 13 years old, amending an ongoing civil suit she’d brought against Diddy in October.

The woman claims both men assaulted her at a 2000 MTV VMAs after-party that she was brought to by one of Diddy’s drivers. Although Jay-Z swiftly denied her claim, the allegation has people reexamining another years-old story about his behavior.

A resurfaced video, which started gaining traction on Reddit, shows Rihanna telling Tyra Banks about how she was signed to Def Jam as a 17-year-old in 2005, when Jay-Z was president and CEO of the label.

Both Jay-Z and Reid have shared similar anecdotes about that night as evidence of how impressed they were with Rihanna’s talent.

The same year it happened, Jay-Z told Sway that Def Jam was so excited about his label’s new up-and-comer that “we didn’t let her leave the office till 3 in the morning, when that contract got signed.” Years later, in Reid’s 2016 memoir, he suggested that the urgency had been his idea — after he heard Rihanna sing, Reid wrote that he told Jay-Z, “Don’t let her leave the building.”

Jay-Z has been described as a mentor of Rihanna’s; she left Def Jam in 2014 to work with his label Roc Nation, and he reportedly helped organize her 2023 Super Bowl halftime performance.