Mötley Crüe drummer Tommy Lee has been accused of sexual assault, in an incident in 2003.
A new civil lawsuit filed on Friday by an unnamed woman, Jane Doe – and reported by Rolling Stone – accuses Lee of “forcibly groping, kissing and penetrating her with his fingers, and attempting to force her to perform oral copulation”. The woman had been invited on to a helicopter by pilot David Martz and believed she would be on a sightseeing tour around San Diego, but was told they would be flying with Lee to Los Angeles.
Lee allegedly invited her to the cockpit where he assaulted her. “Plaintiff was in tears, but she had nowhere to go – she was trapped with little mobility to leave the cockpit,” the lawsuit reads. She alleged Martz and Lee drank alcohol and took drugs while on board.
The lawsuit names Mayhem Touring, Tommy Lee Inc, A Natural High Helicopters and Social Helicopters as defendants. None of them has yet commented on the allegations. The woman is seeking damages. She said she hadn’t previously reported the event because she didn’t believe police would treat her case seriously, and that it was an isolated incident. She now believes Martz and Lee “had a history of engaging in indecent and illegal conduct on Martz’s helicopter”.
Martz died in 2015 when a plane he was flying crashed. In 2009 he was detained on suspicion of flying under the influence, but a sobriety test was inconclusive. He lost his pilot’s licence three times, including after one occasion where he had oral sex with an adult film star while flying a helicopter.
Lee was also jailed for six months in 1998 for physically assaulting his wife, Pamela Anderson.
Mötley Crüe completed a joint headline tour with Def Leppard earlier this year, with Mötley Crüe’s set described as “crass and limp” in a Guardian review.
