1. They first met in 2014 after he threatened to beat up her then-boyfriend. (Warning – the following story has some graphic details of domestic abuse.) Rapper XXXTentacion, 20, was shot dead in Broward County, Florida on June 19, and while many mourned his death, others were quick to point out his history of homophobia, misogyny and violent abuse. Specifically, many brought up the allegations made by his ex, Geneva Ayala. This relationship began in November 2014, and it all seemed to start off on the right foot. Geneva’s then-boyfriend posted an illicit picture of Geneva to Twitter without her consent, according to the Miami New Times, prompting XXX (born Jahseh Onfroy) to step in. “He was like, ‘Your boyfriend’s not supposed to be doing shit like this,’ ” she told the New Times, and Jahseh insisted on fighting the boyfriend. The fight never happened. She and XXX fell out of contact until they reconnected in 2016.
2. Shortly after they began dating, he was arrested for beating her. Geneva and Jahseh reconnected at one of his impromptu concerts near Oakland Park in May 2016. “He locked eyes with me,” she told the Miami New Times, adding that he then grabbed her by the throat. “He made it seem sexy.” Five months later, after having moved in with XXX, she had to flee for her life. On Oct. 6, 2017, Geneva claims she was laying on XXX’s chest when, in a jealous rage, he snapped and began to beat her.
For fifteen minutes, according to her official deposition, per Heavy.com, XXX punched, slapped, elbowed, strangled and head-butted the pregnant Geneva. He paused the attack, only to start again until the couples’ roommate had come home. Her left eye was nearly pulverized to the point that she couldn’t recognize herself in the mirror XXX took her phone and left her in the back room of the house for two days, before she was able to escape and contact the police. He was charged with “aggravated battery of a pregnant woman, domestic battery by strangulation, false imprisonment, and witness tampering,” according to Pitchfork.
3. The abuse started early. The Oct. 2016 incident wasn’t the only time he allegedly assaulted her, according to Geneva. Two weeks after moving into his home, he smashed her phone after she was admiring one of her childhood friend’s new grills in a Snapchat video. He also allegedly smacked her in the face. “I got slapped for no reason,” she says, “and he kept acting like everything was cool.”
4. He denied all allegations of abuse. That wasn’t the end of it. Later in the day of that first slap, she claims XXX hit her again and instructed her to stay in the room. He left, only to return with “a long-handled barbecue fork and a wire barbecue brush,” per the New Times. “He was like, ‘Which one do you want me to use?’ ” Geneva said, claiming he was going to put one up her vagina. As he raked the fork against the skin of her thigh, she passed out. “When I came to, I remember just thinking, I cannot let this happen to me,’ “ she said. ‘This, right here, cannot happen to me.’ “
Her deposition detailed a pattern of verbal and physical attacks throughout the length of their relationship. She says he would choke her, break clothes hangers over her legs, threaten to chop of her hair or cut out her tongue, among other things. XXX denied the allegations. “Geneva fucked my homeboy… She tried to bribe me and my mother and my people for $3,000,” he said. “Stop believing the motherf*cking rumors. I did not beat that bitch; she got jumped. Bye.” He would also make claims that she was never pregnant in the first date.
Oh, Geneva needed surgery on her eye, which had sustained a fracture along the left orbital floor that was damaging her optic nerve. She started a GoFundMe to cover the $20k price tag. However, XXX’s fans bombarded the page with reports of fraud, getting it shut down. A year and a half later, after the New Times report, GoFundMe reversed the decision and reopened the page. It quickly raised over 30k.
5. She didn’t testify him during his 2017 trial. She claims she did this at the rapper’s request. “I was scared,” she said. “He always invited all his fans to go to every court appearance… When I walk out of the courtroom and onto the street, what are people going to do?” Prosecutors, suspecting XXX coerced Geneva, charged him with 15 counts of witness tampering, submitting 213 phone calls XXX supposedly made from jail to his friends and witnesses, including Geneva. When the New Times requested to hear the calls, XXX’s lawyers objected, claiming that the audio was “exempt because it amounted to a ‘confession.’ ” After an emergency hearing, the judge sealed the records until September.
Geneva, after suffering continual harassment from XXX’s fans, was last reported to be saving up money to move out to “somewhere in the country, where there aren’t any people.”