Nicki Minaj has narrowly avoided a real estate nightmare after cutting a half-million-dollar check just moments before a judge could pull the keys to her California mansion.
For nearly two years, the rap icon and her husband, Kenneth Petty, reportedly ignored a $500,000 judgment owed to Thomas Weidenmüller, a security guard who accused Petty of a brutal assault during a 2019 tour stop in Germany.
The standoff reached a fever pitch this week when a Los Angeles judge prepared to force the sale of the couple’s twenty-million-dollar Hidden Hills mansion to settle the debt. However, in a development described by lawyers as “eleventh-hour,” the funds were finally transferred, stopping the auction of their eleven-thousand-square-foot home just as the gavel was set to fall.
The roots of this legal drama stretch back to a chaotic night in Frankfurt, Germany, where the “Nicki Wrld Tour” took a violent turn behind the scenes. According to the original lawsuit, Nicki Minaj became enraged with a female security guard after a fan managed to get onto the stage during her performance. Weidenmüller, serving as the head of security, stepped in to protect his colleague from the rapper’s verbal tirade, only to find himself summoned to Nicki’s dressing room later that night. It was there that he alleges Kenneth Petty punched him in the face, a blow so severe that it reportedly broke his jaw and required multiple surgeries and a week-long hospital stay.
While Petty managed to leave Germany before local authorities could apprehend him, the legal consequences eventually caught up to the couple on American soil. Weidenmüller sued for battery and negligence in 2022, eventually winning a default judgment after Minaj and Petty allegedly failed to respond to the claims.
Despite the legal victory, the security guard faced another uphill battle: actually getting paid. After being “stonewalled” for months, Weidenmüller’s legal team used a powerful maneuver known as a property levy, placing a lien on the couple’s Hidden Hills estate that gave the court the authority to sell the house to satisfy the debt.
The financial stakes of a forced sale would have been disastrous for the couple. Although the mansion is valued at twenty million dollars, a separate thirteen-million-dollar mortgage with Bank of America would have been paid off first from the proceeds. After settling the security guard’s half-million-dollar debt and covering various court fees, Nicki Minaj and Petty would have likely walked away with just a fraction of their home’s actual value. By paying the judgment at the very last second, Nicki protected her primary residence and put an end to a saga that had shadowed her career for over 5 years.
Following the court hearing, Weidenmüller’s attorney, Paul Saso, didn’t hold back when addressing the press outside the courthouse. He expressed satisfaction that justice was finally served, but he also took a sharp jab at Minaj’s recent online behavior. Saso noted that the rapper has been “very vocal” on social media lately, often demeaning various communities. He remarked that he was happy the case helped her “transition” from someone who avoids responsibility to someone who is forced to take it.
