Los Angeles – Four former Smokey Robinson housekeepers allege in a trial filed Tuesday that the Motown music light has attacked them and sexually raped several times while they worked for him.
The prosecution filed at the Los Angeles Superior Court requires at least $ 50 million in damages on alleged assaults, which, according to women, took place between 2007 and 2024, and labor violations, including a hostile work environment, illegally long hours and a lack of remuneration.
A message asking for comments from a representative for Robinson, 85, was not immediately answered.
The four women each say that Robinson would wait for him to be alone with them in his house in Los Angeles, then attack them and violate them sexually on their objections.
“We believe that Mr. Robinson is a serial and sick rapist and must be arrested,” said women's lawyer John Harris at a press conference.
Everything said they finally left the assaults, but in some cases it took several years. And all said they were fearing to manifest themselves on fears of reprisals, the shame of the public and the possible effects on their immigration status.
“Having to tell their husbands and children to tell these despicable actions left them with shame and embarrassment,” said Harris. “So, throughout their terrible experiences with Mr. Robinson, the four women remained silent.”
He said that as low salary employees, they also feared “missing a day of pay and not being able to afford to rent or buy food for their families”.
The four women have retained their legal names citing confidentiality problems and are identified as Jane in court documents. They appeared during the press conference with their lawyers, but did not speak and covered their faces of masks.
The trial also appoints Robinson's wife, Frances Robinson, as a defendant, alleging that she has enabled her behavior despite the knowledge of past sexual misconduct. This also blame it for the hostile working environment, saying that it reprimanded them with a language that included ethnic insults.
A woman said that she was working for the Robinsons from 2012 to 2024 and had been attacked at least 20 times during this period. Another said that she worked for them from 2014 to 2020 and that she had been attacked at least 23 times. Another said that she was working for them for a year before arresting in 2024 and that she had been attacked at least seven times. The fourth woman, who said that she had also acted as a personal assistant to Frances Robinson, hairdresser and cook, worked for them for 18 years before resigning in 2024. She cited experiences similar to other women, but did not say how often she was attacked.
Women, some of whom have worked for the Robinsons at the same time as each other, have also kept stories of assault from each other, but now binds on their experience, lawyers said. They refused to give details at the press conference on the way they come forward and learned that there were others.
The prosecution requires damages according to the sexual battery, assault, false penalty, gender violence and other allegations.
“Obviously, no amount of money can compensate these women for what Mr. Robinson put them,” said Harris. But he said that the $ 50 million was justified “on the basis of the gravity of the contemptible and reprehensible misconduct of Mr. Robinson”.
The lawyer for the complainants, Herbert Hayden, said that even if they thought that assaults were worthy of criminal investigation, women did not table police reports, on the same fear that prevented them from manifesting themselves.
Robinson, a member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the Temple of the Connigate of the Compositers, was among the greatest Hitmakers of the 1960s – both with his group The Miracles and as a solo artist, with songs including “Tears of a Clown” and “The Tracks of My Tears”.
It was a central element of the Motown Records music machine in his hometown of Detroit as an artist, producer and songwriter for other artists.
