Cardi B added another legal win to her record Friday after a Los Angeles County judge tossed out a security guard’s push for a new trial stemming from a 2018 confrontation outside a Beverly Hills medical office.
Judge Ian Fusselman rejected Emani Ellis’s claims that jurors were influenced by Cardi’s behavior outside the courtroom, including a moment caught on video where the rapper threw a pen to the ground after being questioned by YouTuber Donat Ricketts about pregnancy rumors involving NFL wide receiver Stefon Diggs.
“We’re speculating about how it impacted them,” Fusselman said during the hearing, Rolling Stone reports. “Wouldn’t that tend to help your case, rather than hurt it?”
Ellis also argued that two of Cardi’s defense witnesses should have been disqualified due to late disclosure, but the judge dismissed that as well, affirming the jury’s September decision in favor of the Grammy-winning artist.
The original lawsuit centered on a February 2018 incident where Ellis claimed Cardi B, born Belcalis Almánzar, scratched her face with acrylic nails during a heated exchange. At the time, Cardi believed Ellis was secretly recording her outside an OB-GYN office while she was pregnant with her first child with Offset.
During the two-day trial, Cardi testified that there was no physical contact between the two. “She didn’t hit me. I didn’t hit her. There was no touch,” she told the jury, describing the interaction as limited to words.
Jurors took just one hour to deliberate before siding with Cardi in September. The courtroom win adds to a string of legal victories for the Bronx rapper. In 2022, she secured a $4 million defamation judgment against YouTuber Tasha K, who later agreed to repay $1.2 million as part of a settlement.
Cardi also prevailed in a California federal case involving the unauthorized use of a man’s back tattoo on her mixtape artwork and had a libel suit dismissed in a New York court.
Judge Fusselman also indicated that Ellis’s attorney, Ron Rosen Janfaza, may face sanctions for repeatedly referring to a psychologist who had been barred from testifying during the trial. Cardi’s legal success comes amid a packed year that included the September release of her sophomore album, Am I the Drama? and the birth of her fourth child with Diggs in November.
The album featured “Courtroom Edition” CD covers inspired by her legal battles.