Shannon “Shay” Ruth sued Backstreet Boys‘ Nick Carter on Thursday, December 8, accusing him of raping her on a bus back in 2001, during the boy band’s Black & Blue worldwide concert tour. At the time of the incident, she was 17 years old. Presently she is 39.

The alleged victim emotionally broke down in a Facebook Livestream and revealed tearfully that Carter had sexually assaulted her when she was a minor.

“The last 21 years have been filled with pain, confusion, frustration, shame, and self-harm that are a direct result of Nick Carter raping me,” the victim alleged. “Even though I’m autistic and live with cerebral palsy, I believe that nothing has affected me more or had a more lasting impact on my life than what Nick Carter did and said to me.”

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Carter has denied the allegations. “This accusation is categorically false, Nick is focusing on his family and mourning the death of his brother,” an unidentified source close to the singer told TMZ.

Who is Shannon ‘Shay’ Ruth?

It is likely she is a resident of Clark County, Nevada, as she has filed a lawsuit against the singer there. The civil action seeks monetary damages for the pain and suffering as well as punitive damages in an amount to be determined at trial.

She claimed Carter picked her out of a line of fans at the Tacoma Dome in Washington on the night of the incident and invited her to join him on his tour bus. At the time, she was a virgin, the court documents say.

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Revealing details about the alleged crime, Ruth said that Carter asked her if she wanted a drink and offered her a “red-colored drink” he called a “VIP juice.” At the time she thought the drink tasted a bit off and she now thinks it was a mix of alcohol and cranberry juice.

She then alleges she was forcefully pushed onto a bed by Carter who then removed her pants against her wishes. Carter then allegedly told her to perform oral sex on him as she “begged him to stop.” The boy band member allegedly told her to keep quiet as “he laid on top of her and said it would be our ‘special secret,’” the filing stated. Carter then allegedly proceeded to have sexual intercourse with her.

Ruth then further alleged, “After he raped me, I remember him calling me a ‘retarded bitch’ and grabbing me and leaving bruises on my arm.” The alleged victim said that she got HPV, a sexually transmitted infection, after the incident.

She also added that Carter tried to threaten her when she said she will be reporting the incident. “Carter tried to scare me into silence,” she claimed, saying he told her “he’d turn people against me because he was Nick Carter and had the power to wreck my life.”

“I felt like I had nowhere to turn,” she said. “I truly believed if I told anyone, I would go to jail.”