Rick Ross Arrested on Domestic Battery Charges, Freed on Bond
MIAMI BEACH — Rapper Rick Ross turned himself in to Miami Beach police Thursday on felony battery-by-strangulation and misdemeanor battery charges tied to an August 28 incident at his Star Island home, then walked out of jail the same day after a judge set bond and ordered him to stay away from the woman who accused him.
Ross, legally William Leonard Roberts II, was booked into Miami-Dade’s Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center around 6:10 a.m. on October 1. He is 50. Through his attorneys he pleaded not guilty. Outside the jail he told reporters, “First and foremost, I’m totally innocent of these fabricated allegations made against me,” then said he planned to be in Dubai the next day, Paris on Saturday, and to eat “a bowl of rigatoni with heavy marinara” on Sunday. He repeated the pasta line and declined further questions, adding, “They’re not true.”
Police and charging documents say the woman, identified in court papers only as “JK,” told investigators she had dated Ross for about a year and was living with him. She reported the incident on September 29 and provided timestamped photos of her injuries. According to the arrest affidavit, summarized by the New York Times, CBS Miami, and the Miami Herald, she said Ross woke her that morning “enraged” because she had been tagged in an Instagram photo, accused her of seeing someone else, and struck her each time she denied it — including several blows to the chest. She told police he restricted her breathing by grabbing the collar of her hoodie and twisting it “to the point that she could not breathe,” grabbed her by the ponytail and slammed her into a wall, and hit her in the face, splitting her lip. She said she got out of the house after he pushed her to the floor and tried to spray her with a shower head.
Some outlets, including The Fader and Vibe, have linked the initials and the described injuries to Jazzma Kendrick, a Miami content creator who posted on social media in late September that Ross had “busted her lip” and that she left that day. Police documents reviewed in published reports do not name her in full.
Bond figures differ slightly by outlet. CBS Miami and the Miami Herald reported that Judge Mindy Glazer set $4,000 on the felony strangulation count and $1,000 on the misdemeanor battery count, for $5,000 total, and issued a no-contact order. Other reports put the total at $6,000. Glazer told Ross in court she did not know who he was and that he would be treated like anyone else. His attorney, Bradley Horenstein, asked that the release be expedited because Ross is a public figure. An arraignment is scheduled for October 22.
Horenstein and co-counsel Steve Sadow said in a statement that Ross is being “wrongfully accused by an ex-girlfriend whose true motivations are unclear,” noting that no police report was filed until about a month after the alleged incident. Horenstein told CBS News Miami the allegations are false and asked the public not to rush to judgment. Ross did not give police a statement when he surrendered.
Ross, founder of Maybach Music Group and known for “Hustlin’” and “Aston Martin Music,” has faced assault allegations before. In 2015 he and a bodyguard were arrested in Fayette County, Georgia, on charges that included aggravated assault after a groundskeeper said he was forced into a guesthouse and beaten; those charges were later dropped.
The Miami Beach case remains pending. The charges are accusations. Ross is presumed innocent unless proven guilty.
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