Kesha and Lady Gaga were both told by a "CEO of a major record label" that Dr. Luke had allegedly raped Katy Perry.
The ‘Praying’ singer is being sued for defamation by the producer – who she has previously accused of abusing her – over her allegations he sexually assaulted her and gave her drugs against her will, and earlier this week, it also emerged he’d objected to a claim made in a text by Kesha, which she sent to the ‘Poker Face’ singer about the ‘Roar’ hitmaker.
And now the 31-year-old star’s lawyers have hit out at Luke – whose real name is Lukasz Gottwald – for making the previously-redacted message public as it was a "completely private" discussion and they accused the producer of only doing so in order to further "attack and harass" Kesha.
They said in a statement: "With respect to the recent story regarding Katy Perry, the statement that Dr. Luke assaulted her came from the CEO of a major record label, and was told by that executive at the same time to Kesha and Lady Gaga.
"The startling statement was subsequently discussed in a private, one-on-one text message between Kesha and Lady Gaga. It was neither published nor further distributed. It would have remained completely private, except that Dr. Luke and his team took an email obtained only in discovery and decided to publish it to millions of people in his amended complaint against Kesha, and then claim reputational harm from his own widespread publication.
"Dr. Luke disclosed the private conversation between Kesha and Lady Gaga for no purpose other than to attack, harass, and ultimately bankrupt Kesha.
"His claim that Kesha’s private one-on-one text message about a statement from a record label CEO (to someone who had already heard the same statement) caused damages for which Kesha should be held liable is baseless."
Representatives acting for the producer – who has denied all accusations of sexual assault – slammed the statement and insisted the unnamed executive had nothing to do with the claims.
They said in a statement: "Kesha and her legal team are fully aware that Ms. Perry has unequivocally confirmed that she was not raped by Dr. Luke. Kesha and her attorneys should be ashamed of themselves for not publicly acknowledging this and apologising. Instead, they continue to publicise this and other falsehoods.
"In fact, Kesha’s false accusation involving Ms. Perry came to public light only because Kesha’s attorneys filed the accusation publicly.
"Kesha’s latest press release saying that a music executive told her that Dr. Luke had raped Katy Perry is fully contradicted by that executive. He denied saying that."
It is unclear who the CEO could be as the two pop stars are with different label groups, Kesha is signed to Sony, while Gaga is on Universal, and they have never collaborated publicly.