Jason Derulo facing sexual harassment lawsuit from singer he signed

Jason Derulo is facing accusations of sexual harassment from a woman named Emaza Gibson, a former member of musical group Ceraadi, who Derulo had signed to his Future History imprint at Atlantic Records. This comes from NBC News, which says that Gibson has filed a lawsuit against Derulo for alleged “quid pro quo sexual harassment” tied to the advancement of her musical career.

Gibson says Derulo reached out to her in 2021 after Ceraadi had broken up and she was trying to launch a career as a solo artist, and he signed her to a prospective deal for a mixtape and then a full album within six months, plus a single that was required to feature Derulo. Since the two of them had to convince Atlantic to sign off on this deal, they worked together a lot and Gibson says Derulo would invite her out to drinks and “dinner at a members-only lounge,” but she regularly declined “in order to keep their relationship professional.”

She said he then started asking her to drink while they were in the studio together, which she declined to join in on except for one instance when he gave a drink with “inappropriately large amounts of alcohol.” Gibson says she told Derulo it was too strong and that she “wasn’t a drinker,” but she felt that he was “pushing” it on her and that it felt like “pressure” at that point. She also apparently told him that she wasn’t willing to give up her morals in order to be successful, to which he allegedly suggested that she might have to “take part in ‘goat skin and fish scales.’”

Gibson said she understood that “fish scales” referred to cocaine, but she didn’t understand “goat skin” until the internet led her to “online articles about rituals involving sex, goat sacrifices, and blood.” Gibson apparently took the comment as an “explicit demand for sex-in-exchange-for-success.”

Later, Gibson said she went to New York to meet with Atlantic executives with Derulo, but right before the meeting, he introduced her to a woman named Rosa who would be joining them. When they were alone, Gibson claims that the woman implied that she had been sleeping with Derulo, and during the Atlantic meeting, Derulo played some of her music for the record executives—which Gibson took as a message, indicating that her career was advancing because she was apparently having sex with Derulo.

Gibson’s suit says that Derulo got angry with her when she said that Rosa joining the meeting made her uncomfortable, with him allegedly saying, “What does she have to do with you!? We weren’t going to tell you anything! We don’t have to tell you anything!” Their working relationship apparently soured after that, and there was another alleged incident where Gibson arrived late to a recording session and—in front of multiple people—he angrily “charged” at her and shouted.

That was the last time she saw Derulo, and Atlantic Records reportedly told Gibson that they wanted her to succeed but that they couldn’t “say the same for Jason” (an apparent acknowledgement of his alleged behavior), she was dropped from the label.

Jason Derulo has not publicly commented on the suit or the allegations.