NEW YORK • R&B star Chris Brown made news in 2009 for assaulting Rihanna.

Now, he is named as one of three defendants in a lawsuit filed by a woman who said she was repeatedly raped in his Los Angeles house by the singer's friend - rapper Lowell Grissom Jr - during a drug-and alcohol-fuelled party last year.

Brown's lawyer told gossip portal TMZ on Wednesday that before filing the lawsuit, the woman and her lawyer had demanded US$17 million (S$23 million) from Brown.

According to the lawsuit, she was invited to a party at a recording studio to meet Brown, 29, and Grissom, 32, after attending a concert in Los Angeles.

Upon arrival, she said, her phone was confiscated because Brown did not want such gadgets in the studio. She asked for her phone back, but Grissom said she would need to go with them to Brown's house to retrieve it.

At the house, a "hardcore" party was intensifying and Brown and Grissom had many guns out in the open, which intimidated her.

At one point, Brown brandished a gun, she said.

She added that she was then lured to an upper floor under the notion that she would get her phone back. She was taken to a room where there were other women.

Brown told Grissom to block the door and then put on pornography and loud music to muffle any noise before the two men proceeded to engage in sexual acts with some of the women, according to the lawsuit.

The accuser said she was forced to perform oral sex on Grissom.

She added that he also raped her in other areas of Brown's house before returning her phone and allowing her to leave.

According to the lawsuit, she then headed to a rape centre and contacted the police.

NYTIMES