US actor Evan Rachel Wood has denied pressuring a woman into making sexual assault allegations against rock star Marilyn Manson.
In February 2021, Wood and four other women claimed that Manson, real name Brian Warner, had subjected them to various forms of abuse: sexual, physical and emotional, including attacks characterised as torture.
Last week one of those women, Ashley Morgan Smithline – whose subsequent lawsuit against Manson was dismissed by a California court in January – recanted her allegations, claiming that she had “succumbed to pressure from Evan Rachel Wood and her associates to make accusations of rape and assault against Mr Warner that were not true”.
Wood has denied Smithline’s allegations, saying in her own court filing that Smithline initially contacted her, adding: “I never pressured or manipulated Ashley Morgan Smithline to make any accusations against plaintiff Brian Warner, and I certainly never pressured or manipulated her to make accusations that were not true.” Wood included Instagram messages between her and Smithline, and a voicemail message reportedly from Smithline telling a friend that she believed Manson’s legal team wanted her to “turn on the other girls and say it was all a ruse”. Lawyers for Wood also claim Manson’s lawyers pressured and harassed Smithline following her initial lawsuit filing.
Smithline, meanwhile, told Rolling Stone after Wood’s court filing this week: “Evan’s full of shit … she’s saying anything she can to discredit me.”
Manson has always denied any wrongdoing, and is currently suing Wood and her partner Illma Gore for defamation. A judge has denied his request to have Smithline’s recantation included as evidence in that case.
In January, Manson settled out of court with actor Esmé Bianco, who had accused him of rape and sexual battery. Bianco’s representatives said she had agreed to the settlement, whose terms were not disclosed, “in order to move on with her life and career”.
Later that month, Manson faced a fresh lawsuit from an unnamed plaintiff, who alleges that he sexually assaulted her in 1995 when she was 16, and again across the space of a month when she was 19. Manson has not yet commented on that lawsuit.
