Nicki Minaj appeared to be the target of a swatting call claiming a shooter was at her Hidden Hills residence on Wednesday evening.
At 7:05 p.m., the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department received a report of an assault with a deadly weapon in the community, according to a department spokesperson. The caller said that a friend shot a female Black adult and that two possible suspects were at the location wearing all black, the spokesperson said.
The report was later determined to be a swatting call — a false 911 call made with the deliberate intent to trigger a law enforcement response — as deputies arrived on scene and found no evidence of a crime, according to the Lost Hills Sheriff’s Station watch commander.
The Sheriff’s Department would not say whether the call was for the hip-hop artist’s home, but a neighbor confirmed to The Times that law enforcement responded to Minaj’s residence.
She purchased a sprawling 12,000-square-foot property for $19.5 million in 2022 in the same exclusive San Fernando Valley enclave where several of the Kardashians own luxurious homes, according to reporting from TMZ.
The spokesperson said the call came in on a business line and was the only report received for an assault with a deadly weapon at the address — both common signs of swatting. The business line makes it harder to trace the caller’s identity and, in the case of credible reports of violence, authorities typically receive multiple 911 calls, he said.
This was not the first time the Grammy Award-winning artist appeared to have been targeted by swatters.
Sheriff’s deputies responded to Minaj’s home in June 2023 following a false report of child abuse and, a month later, to a false report of a shooting, according to TMZ.
Swatting calls are a growing problem in Southern California and across the nation. The FBI reported in January 2024 that agents opened investigations into more than 100 separate threats targeting over 1,000 institutions in 42 states during a one-month period alone.
Many Los Angeles area celebrities have been recent victims, including Jennifer Aniston, JoJo Siwa and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
