Music Scene Predators: An Incomplete List

After we began developing our article The Problem with Steve Albini in 2022, we also began this article, which is essentially a list of other musicians with questionable, borderline predatory, or outright predatory behavior. We briefly mentioned that we would release this in response to a question from a viewer during our live Murder Talk Radio episode about Albini (an edited version of which will be released as an official episode tomorrow morning).

We will also be doing another livestream of Murder Talk Radio later today in support of this article; time TBD but it should be sometime this afternoon or early evening.

Some of the musicians on this list are only predators by extremely modern standards of behavior; teenaged minors routinely appeared in Playboy and other adult magazines into the 70s (and in some cases, notably Traci Lords in Penthouse, the 80s). For balance as it relates to this historical cultural acceptance, and also so as not to take away the agency of young women, we have also included the stories of “groupies” associated with this behavior.

These “questionable” stories make up the first half of our article, under the section titled Hebe/Phebo. Others, however, had darker, more predatory interests that would have been viewed harshly even a century ago. These make up the second half of our article, under the section titled Paedo. The modern public opinion on what is now called pedophilia or paedophilia was founded upon a series of articles that ran in 1885 in a British newspaper called the Pall Mall Gazette titled "The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon" which made the sexual abuse of children a hot topic in the public discourse.

The articles were written by a journalist named William Thomas Stead about child prostitution. Stead was a crusader against the sexual exploitation of children, and made a provocative gambit: he bought a 13-year-old girl, and wrote about it. Stead purchased 13-year-old Eliza Armstrong from her parents, had her professionally examined to prove that she was still a virgin, then had her sent to a brothel, where she was lightly drugged. Stead entered the room, and then immediately withdrew to go write his story, and had Eliza given into the care of the Salvation Army.

The series brought nearly a quarter of a million people out into the streets of London to demand that the age of consent be increased, beginning a social movement against the sexual exploitation of children that echoed across the West, and only grew stronger through the 20th century. By the outbreak of World War I, most countries had age of consent laws that made it illegal to engage in sexual congress with anyone younger than their mid teens.

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Hebe/Phebo

Elvis Presley

met Priscilla Wagner at a party at his rented home in Bad Nauheim, Germany on September 13, 1959 when she was 14 years old and he was 24. Elvis allegedly regressed to acting like an "awkward, embarrassed" boy-next-door but reportedly managed to compose himself. Priscilla’s parents were upset by her late return home, demanding that she never see Elvis again, but he and Priscilla were frequently together in the months that followed.

In the summer of 1962, Priscilla's parents agreed to let her visit Elvis for two weeks on the condition that Elvis pay for a first-class round trip, arrange for her to be chaperoned at all times, and that Priscilla write home every day. Elvis agreed to these demands, and flew Priscilla to Los Angeles. When she arrived, Elvis told her they were going to Las Vegas, had Priscilla write to her parents in advance, and had the postcards mailed from Los Angeles by a member of his staff.

In May 1967, Elvis, then 32, and Priscilla, then 21, married in a small ceremony in Las Vegas. Their divorce was finalized in October 1973, and was reportedly amicable. Priscilla said in a 2016 interview, “I did not divorce him because I didn't love him. He was the love of my life, but I had to find out about the world.”

They shared custody of Lisa Marie and regularly saw each other following the divorce.

Jerry Lee Lewis

had a turbulent life largely hidden from public view until a 1958 British tour where a news agency reporter at London's Heathrow Airport learned about Lewis's third wife, his first cousin once removed, Myra Gale Brown. Brown was 13-years-old when they married, while Lewis was 22-years-old, and told people she was 15.

The negative press Lewis received as a result of the story caused his tour to be canceled. As it turned out, Lewis wasn’t fully divorced his previous wife, Jane Mitcham, and he had to remarry Brown on June 4, 1958 to make the marriage legal as a result.

In 1970, Brown filed for divorce on grounds of adultery and abuse, and said she had been "subject to every type of physical and mental abuse imaginable." Their divorce was finalized on December 9, 1970.

Chuck Berry

was arrested in December 1959 after allegations that he had had sex with a 14-year-old waitress whom he transported across state lines to work at his club. After a two-week trial in March 1960, he was convicted, fined $5,000, and sentenced to five years in prison. He appealed, arguing that the racist attitude and comments made by the judge had prejudiced the jury against him.

The appeal was upheld, and a second trial was heard in May and June 1961, resulting in another conviction and a three-year prison sentence. After another appeal failed, Berry served one and one-half years in prison, from February 1962 to October 1963.

In 1987, Berry was charged with assaulting a woman at New York's Gramercy Park Hotel, accused of causing "lacerations of the mouth, requiring five stitches, two loose teeth, [and] contusions of the face." He pled guilty to a lesser charge and paid a $250 fine.

In 1990, Berry was sued by several women who claimed that he had installed a video camera in the women’s bathroom of his restaurant. Berry claimed that he had had the camera installed to catch a worker who was suspected of stealing from the restaurant.

A police raid on his house found intimate videotapes of women, one of whom was apparently a minor, along with 62 grams of marijuana. The child abuse charges were eventually dropped, and Berry agreed to plead guilty to misdemeanor possession of marijuana. He was given a six month suspended jail sentence, placed on two years unsupervised probation, and was ordered to donate $5,000 to a local hospital.

Later, videos Berry recorded of himself urinating on a woman and another of her defecating on him would surface. Although best remembered for his song “Johnny B Good,” his only number one song on the Billboard charts was the innuendo charged “My Ding-a-Ling”

Steven Tyler

obtained legal guardianship of 16-year-old Julia Holcomb in 1973 when he was 25. They lived in Boston doing drugs together while they dated for 3 years. Look Away, a documentary about sexual abuse in the music industry, features Holcomb's story.

Holcomb filed a lawsuit in December 2022 alleging that Tyler sexually assaulted her and forced her to undergo an abortion, pushing drugs and alcohol on her after promising to take care of her in the guardianship agreement.

The lawsuit also claimed he used his fame and status to "groom, manipulate, exploit, [and] sexually assault" her. In a motion to dismiss filed in March 2023, Tyler claimed their relationship was consensual and that he had immunity since he was her legal guardian at the time. The motion further stated that Tyler's actions with regards to the abortion decision were legitimate, justified, and in good faith, as there were concerns about the health of the baby in light of the drug use, as well as smoke inhalation from a house fire. That suit is still ongoing.

It has been alleged that the lyrics to the song “Walk this Way” refer to Holcomb;

Schoolgirl sweetie with the classy kinda sassy
Little skirt's climbin' way up the knee
There was three young ladies in the school gym locker
When I noticed they was lookin' at me
I was a high school loser, never made it with a lady
'Til the boys told me somethin' I missed
Then my next door neighbor with a daughter had a favor
So I gave her just a little kiss

A separate lawsuit filed by former teen model Jeanne Bellino was dismissed in early 2024 by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan. Bellino sued Tyler under a New York “look back” law allowing abuse victims to sue over decades-old claims, claiming he forcibly kissed, groped and humped her twice over a single day in Manhattan in the summer of 1975.

Judge Kaplan ruled that Bellino’s case did not qualify under the statute, which applies only in cases where the abuser’s actions presented a “serious risk of physical injury.” Kaplan ruled that Tyler’s alleged actions did not qualify.

Ted Nugent

admitted to several affairs with underage girls in a Behind the Music episode, but later denied that this actually occurred while appearing on an episode of The Joe Rogan Experience, saying he had never been in romantic relationships with underage girls, other than when he was underage.

Musician Courtney Love claims that she performed oral sex on Nugent when she was 12, though on another occasion she said she was 14. In 1978, Nugent began a relationship with 17-year-old Hawaii native Pele Massa. They could not marry due to her age, and like Stephen Tyler before him, Nugent and Massa's parents signed documents making Nugent her legal guardian.

Jimmy Page

Page had well-documented relationships with groupies including Lori Mattix (also known as Lori Maddox) beginning when she was 14 or 15, as well as other teenagers including Sable Starr and Bebe Buell.

Lori Maddox

At 13, Mattix began frequenting clubs like the Whisky a Go Go and the Rainbow Bar and Grill on the Sunset Strip in West Hollywood with her friend Sable Starr. In June 1972, while Led Zeppelin were in Los Angeles for their 1972 North American tour, Led Zeppelin guitarist Jimmy Page, who was 28 at the time, began a relationship with 13-year-old Mattix. Mattix claims the relationship began by her being "basically kidnapped" by Led Zeppelin's tour manager Richard Cole and brought to Page's hotel room. According to Rolling Stone, Page went to great lengths to keep the relationship a secret due the illegality of statutory rape.

Their relationship lasted for more than two years before ending in 1975. Mattix claimed she ended the relationship when she was 16-years-old after finding Page in bed with Bebe Buell. Buell gave an alternate version of these events, claiming that despite the fact that Mattix "had given herself exclusively to Jimmy (Page) from age 14 to 16," she was barred by Page's security from seeing him once he began dating Buell.

Mattix says that when she was 14 years old, she was introduced to David Bowie while he was in Los Angeles on his Ziggy Stardust Tour. When Bowie's tour returned to Los Angeles five months later, Mattix claimed Bowie's bodyguard was sent to pick up her and Starr for a sexual encounter. Mattix told Thrillist in 2015 that she and Starr met Bowie at the Rainbow Bar before the three went to Bowie's hotel suite and had sex: "…[Bowie] de-virginized me… That night I lost my virginity and had my first threesome."

However, Starr gave a conflicting account of the same events, claiming that she had sex with Bowie alone, and Mattix was no longer with them by the time they reached the hotel.

Mattix gave a different account to music journalist Paul Trynka, in which she claimed that she and Starr found the hotel room Bowie was staying in, sneaking in uninvited. In this version of events, Mattix claimed that Bowie was "tired" and that it was they who initiated the sexual encounter with him. Mattix claimed to have seen Bowie "many times" in the decade afterwards. Mattix's account is also contradicted by Pamela Des Barres' 1987 memoir I'm with the Band: Confessions of a Groupie.

Mattix alleges to have engaged in relations with Mick Jagger, Jeff Beck, Ronnie Wood, Mickey Finn, Angela Bowie (David Bowie’s ex wife), Keith Emerson, and Carl Palmer.

Sable Starr

Sable Starr with Iggy Pop

Sabel Hay Shields, also known as Sable Starr, was an American Rock and Roll groupie often described as the "queen of the groupie scene" during the 1970s. Iggy Pop's song "Look Away" states that he "slept with" Starr when she was 13 years of age, and implies she slept around in LA until running off to NYC with Johnny Thunders.

I slept with Sable when she was 13
Her parents were too rich to do anything
She rocked her way around LA
'Til a New York Doll carried her away

Starr said that she lost her virginity when she was 12 to Randy California, the guitarist from the band Spirit, after a gig at Topanga, California. Starr also claimed to have had relationships with David Bowie, Robert Plant, Jimmy Page. Starr ran away from home when she was 16 to live with New York Dolls guitarist Johnny Thunders in NYC.

Their relationship did not last due to his violent jealousy and drug addiction. He tried to marry her after she became pregnant, but she had an abortion instead. Unable to adjust to New York life, and tired of the physical abuse from Thunders, Starr eventually moved back to Los Angeles.

She claimed that Thunders "tried to destroy my personality. After I was with him, I just wasn't Sable Starr anymore. He really destroyed the Sable Starr thing."

Starr admitted to having gotten into fights with rival groupies like Lori Mattix, who claimed that Starr once told her to "keep her hands" off Jimmy Page, saying "if you touch him, I will shoot you. He's mine.”

Bebe Buell described Starr as having been one of the two top Los Angeles groupies of the era, adding that "every rock star who came to Los Angeles wanted to meet her".

Starr made frequent visits to New York after she left, where she had an affair with Richard Hell of Television and the Voidoids, befriended Nancy Spungen, girlfriend of Sid Vicious, and participated in the early New York punk rock scene.

By the early 1980s, she took a job as a table game dealer at Carson Valley Inn in Minden, NV, where she worked until shortly before her death from brain cancer at the age of 51 at her home in Nevada on April 18, 2009.

Bebe Buell

Buell rejects being a "groupie" but nonetheless dated many musicians beginning with Paul Cowsill of the Cowsills, the band that inspired the 70s tv show The Partridge Family, when she was 15.

She also dated Mick Jagger, Iggy Pop, David Bowie, Elvis Costello, Todd Rundgren, Jimmy Page, Duran Duran's John Taylor, and Steven Tyler, among others. From 1972 to 1978, Bebe Buell had a long-term, on again off again relationship with Todd Rundgren. In 1976, Buell became unexpectedly pregnant from a brief relationship with Steven Tyler. On July 1, 1977, Buell gave birth to future actress/model Liv Tyler, but initially claimed that Todd Rundgren was the father in an effort to protect Liv from Tyler's drug addiction.

Rundgren and Buell ended their romantic relationship shortly after Liv's birth. Liv learned that she was Steven Tyler's biological daughter at the age of 9. Buell later married musician and actor Coyote Shivers, best known for his role in Empire Records, in which he costars with Liv Tyler, and for the great song “Sugar High” which appears in the movie. Buell and Shivers divorced in 1999.

In the movie, Rene Zellweger performs the song with Coyote Shivers. In an interview with Consequence of Sound, Shivers explains why Zellweger isn’t on the soundtrack; the record company didn’t want it on the soundtrack at all, and the music supervisor thought the song was too loud. The song’s producer declined to re-master the track, and according to Shivers, the supervisor instead used “the rough mix that was meant just for playback while filming. And the label put it as the last song on the record on the original pressing.”

As a mostly unrelated side note, Screenwriter Carol Heikkinen says that Rex Manning Day, the day that the movie takes place, is an homage to Kurt Cobain’s death. Embry told The Wrap in 2015. “April 8th is the same day they found Kurt Cobain’s body. It’s not the day he died. We shot that the same year they found him, so it represents the death of a rock star. Nobody ever says it in the movie. Nobody ever says April 8th.”

Rex Manning Day is still celebrated every year by fans of the film, in which the character of Rex Manning, allegedly modelled on Tom Jones, sexually exploits Rene Zellweger’s character, Gina, in the back room of the Empire Records store.

For the film Almost Famous, music journalist and filmmaker Cameron Crowe developed the "band-aid" character Penny Lane as a composite of girls he saw backstage in the late 1960s and early 1970s at concerts calling themselves the "Flying Garter Girls". Buell partially inspired Crowe; he named a lead singer character Jeff Bebe in her honor.

Pamela Des Barnes

best known for her 1987 memoir, I'm with the Band: Confessions of a Groupie, which details her experiences in the LA rock music scene of the 60s and 70s. She is also a former member of the experimental Frank Zappa-produced music group the GTOs.

While she was still in high school, a friend introduced Des Barres to his cousin, a musician known as Captain Beefheart, and a friend of Frank Zappa. Besides Zappa, Beefheart also introduced her to Charlie Watts and Bill Wyman of the Rolling Stones, and before long she was hanging out with other bands like the Byrds.

She was romantically linked with artists including Mick Jagger, Jimmy Page, Keith Moon, Gram Parsons, and Don Johnson, who is better known for his role in Miami Vice than for music.

The March 1989 issue of Playboy magazine featured Des Barres nude, published with an article Des Barres wrote for the magazine. In the captions, she was quoted as saying, "I wanted to be in Playboy when I was younger, but my breasts did not precede me. But now I have semi-celebrity tits, so they don't have to be as big."

Pamela Des Barres also said that she once kissed murderer and former Manson Family member Bobby Beausoleil in Golden Gate Park during his pre-Manson days. Des Barres wrote two memoirs about her experience as a groupie, I'm with the Band: Confessions of a Groupie in 1987 and Take Another Little Piece of My Heart: A Groupie Grows Up in 1993.

Although widely believed that Cameron Crowe drew from these memoirs to create Penny Lane for his film Almost Famous, Crowe has said that the character was a composite of various women he knew during his time as a teenaged rock and roll journalist, including one named Pennie Trumbull who went by Pennie Lane. The memoirs by Des Barres have another connection to the film: actress Kate Hudson read them for inspiration as she portrayed Penny Lane.

“Penny Lane” Trumbull

was born in 1954. As a teenager in the early 1970s, Trumbull began pursuing sexual relationships with bands. According to Trumbull,

“I knew by this time that men had different tastes in women and that I couldn’t be everything to everyone, so to be able to appeal to their broad tastes, I went on a scouting mission to meet a cross section of different kinds of girls. It worked. One of us would get picked by the band to go backstage and meet them. And where one of us went, we all went. We wouldn’t get on a plane with a band unless they took all five of us; we looked after each other. We were the ‘Ultimate in Entertainment for Entertainers.’ If you wanted fame, fortune or marriage, you couldn’t be a Flying Garter Girl; you had to love music…"

They had matchbooks made with "The Flying Garter Girls" printed on them to promote themselves. They each gave themselves nicknames, and Trumbull chose the name Pennie Lane in part from the song by the Beatles. The other girls in the group went by names like Marvelous Meg, Sexy Sandy, Miss Julia, and Caroline Can-Can.

Filmmaker Cameron Crowe and Trumbull became friends in the 70s while Crowe was working as a rock journalist for Rolling Stone. When he began work on his now classic film about his experiences during that time, Crowe asked for her permission to use her name and likeness.

Almost Famous is free with ads on YouTube at the time of this publication. Featuring the brilliant Phillip Seymour Hoffman as Lester Bangs, and Kate Hudson as Penny Lane herself. Crowe told The Daily Telegraph that the scene which depicts him losing his virginity to a trio of groupies was “painfully accurate.”

“Well, yes, it really was like that,” he said. “I think I would call that scene painfully accurate. And the painful thing was that the girl I really wanted was the one who was not there. She left the room.”

“The only thing that is really different is that when it happened to me, the music in the background was Steely Dan playing ‘Do It Again,’” he said. “But when I put that in the movie, it seemed like too much, just too cheesy. Oh, and I didn’t do it again.”

“And Penny Lane I have always loved,” said Crowe. “She had an aura, a curious innocence. She was special. There were girls then who really were not just groupies, they were muses. And Penny Lane looked after the others, too. She was something of a teenage mother hen.”

Twiggy Ramirez and Marilyn Manson

Twiggy’s ex-girlfriend Jessicka Addams, lead singer of the band Jack Off Jill, published a Facebook post in October of 2017 accusing White of rape, as well as physical and emotional abuse throughout their five year relationship, from 1992 to 1997. On October 24, 2017, Marilyn Manson tweeted on Twitter that the band had parted ways with Ramirez following allegations of sexual misconduct made against him.

On October 25, 2017, Twiggy issued a statement following the allegations: "I have only recently been made aware of these allegations from over 20 years ago. I do not condone non-consensual sex of any kind. I will be taking some time to spend with my family and focus on maintaining my several years of sobriety. If I have caused anyone pain I apologize and truly regret it.”

In February 2021, Manson’s former fiancée Evan Rachel Wood wrote on Instagram and in a statement to Vanity Fair, accusing Manson of abuse during their own relationship a decade earlier. Four other women simultaneously issued statements also accusing Manson of abuse. Wood continued to make allegations against Manson (and his wife Lindsay Usich), claiming that his alleged abuse included antisemitism, and said she filed a report with the LAPD against Usich based on a threat to leak photographs of Wood dressed in a Nazi uniform wearing a Hitler-styled moustache.

Over a dozen people have made various allegations against Manson, but in a court filing, Ashley Morgan Smithline has recanted her sexual abuse allegations, claiming that she was “manipulated” by Evan Rachel Wood and others to accuse Manson of sexual and physical abuse.

“I succumbed to pressure from Evan Rachel Wood and her associates to make accusations of rape and assault against [Manson] that were not true,” she says in the Feb. 19 declaration that was obtained by The Hollywood Reporter.

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Paedo

Gary Glitter

was arrested in 1997 after images of children were discovered on a laptop that he had taken in for repair. Even more images were discovered by police during searches of his homes. Glitter was sentenced to four months in prison and placed on the sex offender register in the UK after he admitted downloading more than 4,000 separate files of child pornography. He was acquitted on charges stemming from a relationship he had with a 14-year-old girl in the late 1970s.

Following his release in January 2000, Glitter decided to leave the UK due to his public image, and fled to Spain on his yacht. In late 2002, he was detained over his previous sex offences and spent four days in jail before being released on bail. In January 2003, he was deported from Cambodia to Thailand on a flight to Bangkok, eventually ending up in Vietnam, where he came to the attention of authorities after he was banned from a nightclub for allegedly groping a teenage waitress. Witnesses also reported him taking two young girls into his home, where police found he was living with a 15-year-old girl. Six Vietnamese girls and women, ages ranging from 11 to 23, claimed that Glitter had sex with them.

In 2006, Glitter was brought up on charges that he had committed obscene acts with two girls aged 10 and 11, facing up to 14 years. He was found guilty, sentenced to three years in prison, and given a mandatory deportation at the end of his sentence, plus a fine of five million Vietnamese đồng (US$315) that would go to victims families.

In an interview with BBC News in May 2006, Glitter denied that he was a pedophile, and claimed that he had never knowingly had sex with anyone under the age of 18. After this, no less than 19 countries including Cuba, Cambodia, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand, and the Philippines announced that they would refuse entry to Glitter. In August 2008, he arrived at Heathrow Airport, where he was met by British police officers before being added to the Sex Offenders Register for life.

GG Allin

became involved with a teenage girl from Garland, Texas named Tracy Deneault in the 80s. She became pregnant, and their daughter, Nico Ann Deneault, was born on March 13, 1986. Allin and Tracey Deneault never married.

Spencer Elden

was four months old when Nirvana hired Kirk Weddle to photograph their concept for the cover of Nevermind; Weddle submitted a photo of Elden nude in a California pool for the album.

Elden, now 31, first filed suit against surviving Nirvana members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic, Kurt Cobain's estate and Kirk Weddle, the image's photographer, in August 2021, alleging child sexual exploitation.

He claimed that his legal guardians never consented to his image being used for the album cover and asked for $150,000 in damages, along with attorney fees. Elden also accused the rockers of failing to protect him from being sexually exploited, and he claimed that having his naked body on a famous album cover as a baby caused him to suffer "lifelong damages."

U.S. District Judge Fernando Olguin dismissed the lawsuit on the grounds that Spencer Elden waited too long to file such a claim.

Pete Townshend

was “cautioned” by the Metropolitan Police as part of an investigation into child pornography in 2002–2003. The Met stated that "it was established that Mr Townshend was not in possession of any downloaded child abuse images".

Townshend was on a sex offenders register for five years, beginning in 2003, after admitting he had used his credit card to access a child pornography website. Townshend claimed he accessed the images as research for a book against child sexual abuse to prove that British banks were complicit in channelling the profits from pedophile rings.

Townshend later claimed that he abandoned this book on child abuse, which had tentatively (and supposedly) been titled A Different Bomb, saying "This is the book I spoke about that was in preparation when I was arrested. It's about the impact and danger of child porn on the internet: essays about and interviews with casualties of abuse or survivor like myself. I have shelved it. I can't venture publicly into this area again."

Authorities allegedly could not prove that the website involved any children, despite that it was a child pornography website, and no incriminating evidence was found on Townshend’s personal computer.

Stephen Coronel

co-wrote a handful of songs recorded by Kiss. Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons of Kiss were previously in a band with Coronel called Wicked Lester, formerly called Rainbow. Coronel actually introduced Paul Stanley to Gene Simmons at his Washington Heights apartment in the early 1970s.

In 2014, Coronel was charged with possessing child pornography after police determined his IP address was streaming child sexual abuse material depicting a female child between 6 and 11 years of age. Coronel was sentenced to 10 years in prison with 75 days served, and the possibility of serving only six with three years probation.

Cornel was released from prison in 2019 and transferred to South Carolina while awaiting approval to move to Florida. Coronel wrote the song “Going Blind,” featuring the lyrics

Little lady, can't you see
You're so young and so much different than I
I'm 93, you're sixteen
Can't you see I'm goin' blind

'Cause, I think I'm goin' blind
And I know how it's to be, yeah

Jerry Yester

was arrested for 30 counts of possession of child pornography and released on a $35,000 bond in October 2017. His arrest got him dismissed from The Lovin' Spoonful best known for their song “Do You Believe in Magic”. His bandmates said they were shocked by the allegations.

He pled guilty to eight counts of distributing, possessing or viewing matter depicting sexually explicit conduct involving a child on October 9, 2018. In July 2019, Yester was given a two-year prison sentence after his conviction for child pornography possession and he was required to register as a sex offender.

Karl Logan

was arrested in Charlotte, North Carolina on August 9, 2018, for allegedly possessing child pornography. He was charged with six counts of third-degree exploitation of a minor and his bail was set at $35,000. Manowar announced shortly afterwards that he would not perform with them on their last world tour.

Logan was in possession of several videos depicting young girls between ages 4 and 12 years old engaged in a variety of sexual acts with unidentified men. Logan was sentenced to 5 1/2 years in prison in 2022.

Austin Henry Jones

was a YouTuber from 2007 to 2017, when he was arrested for the production of child pornography. He was convicted in 2019. In 2015, Jones apologized after a video of him allegedly teaching an underage girl to twerk surfaced. He had accumulated around 540,000 subscribers and over 20 million video views by the time of his arrest. On February 6, 2019, all his social media accounts were permanently terminated, and on May 3, 2019, Jones was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison for child pornography.

Jesse Lacey

was accused of sexual misconduct by two women in late 2017, who alleged the events occurred 15 years prior while they were underage and Lacey was in his early 20s. Lacey apologized publicly on Brand New's Facebook page and admitted to having a sex addiction in his past, which he had sought treatment for over a decade before the allegations were brought public.

Mike Fuentes

was accused of statutory rape and soliciting nude photos via AOL Instant Messenger by a child in 2017. The incidents are alleged to have occured over several years roughly a decade prior; the pair first initiated contact on MySpace before meeting for the first time at a Pierce the Veil Concert when Fuentes was 24 and the girl was 16. They had sex after meeting again at the Pomona concert stop during Warped Tour, however she admitted to hiding her real age from him in her allegations. The relationship lasted until she became an adult at 18.

A second woman accused him of sexual misconduct, specifically for requesting nude pictures from her when she was a minor, meeting Fuentes at Warped Tour 2008. They exchanged mobile phone numbers and stayed in contact afterwards, and when she turned 15, Fuentes requested nude photos from her. The band replied to these accusations in mid December.

On December 16, 2017, Fuentes responded to the allegations and stated that he is taking a break from Pierce the Veil. Vocalist, guitarist, and brother Vic Fuentes later clarified that Mike Fuentes had not been part of the band since 2017, and would not be returning for their next album.

Dahvi Vanity

at least 21 women have made sexual assault, child molestation, or rape allegations against Vanity. Former bandmates Garrett Ecstasy, who left the band in 2009, and Jayy Von Monroe, who left in 2016, also describe Vanity as a sexual predator.

Jeffree Star and New Years Day members Ash Costello and Nikki Misery have stated that they observed Vanity engage in questionable or illegal sexual behavior during the Vans Warped Tours and also during the "All the Rage Tour 2012" in support of their third studio album of the same name around the early 2010s. Many of the accusers were underage at the time of the alleged attacks. Vanity has responded to the accusations on multiple occasions with denial, threats or evasion..

Burger

the label faced allegations of normalizing a culture of sexual assault, both at its shows and within its roster of artists. Members of multiple groups including SWMRS (Joey Armstrong, Billie Joe Armstrong’s son), Black Lips, The Growlers, The Buttertones, Part Time, Mystic Braves, Cosmonauts, and other groups on the label have been accused of sexual assault, statutory rape, and/or sexual predation.

One such accusation came from Clementine Creevy of Cherry Glazerr, a band which had also put music out on Burger. Burger ceased operations after the allegations emerged in July 2020.