Photographer Sues Rapper Megan Thee Stallion For ‘Severe’ Harassment
A photographer has sued Megan Thee Stallion for harassment and a hostile work environment — claiming that he was forced to watch the rapper have sex with another woman right next to him in a car.
Emilio Garcia, who worked as a photographer for Stallion, filed a lawsuit against the Grammy award-winning rapper in Los Angeles Superior Court on Tuesday.
Garcia claims that Stallion abused him as an employee and unfairly fired him after the incident where he was forced to witness the hip-hop star have sexual intercourse with another woman.
Garcia began working for Stallion, whose real name is Megan Pete, as a personal cameraman in 2018. A year later, he gave up other work to become a full-time photographer with Stallion.
‘Don’t Ever Discuss What You Saw’
In the lawsuit, Garcia alleges that he was in an SUV with Stallion and three other women after a night out in Ibiza, Spain in June 2022.
The photographer claims that Stallion then began having sex with a woman right next to him in the vehicle.
According to court documents, Garcia was unable to get out of the car and was left “embarrassed, mortified, and offended throughout the whole ordeal.”
The following day, Stallion asked Garcia whether he was in the car with her the night before. When the photographer confirmed that he was present in the vehicle, the rapper allegedly told him to never discuss the incident.
“Don’t ever discuss what you saw,” Stallion allegedly told Garcia, according to the lawsuit.
According to a report by NBC News, Garcia says that Stallion started treating him differently after the alleged incident. The photographer says that the “harassment was so severe or pervasive” that it created a “hostile, abusive work environment”
Garcia says that Stallion began hurling fat-shaming insults at him — calling him a “fat b*tch,” “telling him to ‘spit your food out’” and that “you don’t need to be eating.”
‘Treated Differently’
When they returned from the trip to Ibiza, Garcia alleges that his compensation structure with Stallion was changed from a monthly flat rate to a pay-per-task system that required him to submit invoices for each assignment.
The photographer says that he was expected to provide the same services despite the pay structure change, but alleges that he was treated differently following the incident and saw a decline in bookings that Stallion hired him to do.
The lawsuit states that Garcia began to consider quitting the job because of Megan’s “possessiveness combined with a lack of appropriate pay for the amount of time asked of him” as well as a lack of bookings.
However, NBC News reports that Garcia remained on the rapper’s schedule for a job in June 2023. But the evening before, her label Roc Nation notified him that “his services would no longer be required” by Stallion.
Garcia is seeking financial damages to be determined at trial, alleging he has suffered severely both emotionally and physically because of his treatment on the job, the firing, and having to witness the scene in the SUV.
Stallion’s attorney Alex Spiro says that the rapper will fight Garcia’s lawsuit in court.
“This is an employment claim for money — with no sexual harassment claim filed and with salacious accusations to attempt to embarrass her,” Spiro says in a statement on Tuesday.
Image credits: Header photo licensed via Depositphotos.
