Usher ‘accuser said they had protected sex, never planned to sue’

A woman who accused Usher of putting her at risk of herpes insisted she only had protected sex with him, just two days before filing a lawsuit against the singer.

Laura Helm filed a lawsuit against the ‘OMG’ hitmaker on July 21, in which she stated the 38-year-old star did not use a condom when they had sex in New Orleans, but two days before, she was recorded on the phone telling a man she had no plans to sue the singer because they had been careful.

In a recording obtained by TMZ, she said: “That’s why they make protection, for people who have STDs.”

However, Laura’s attorney, Lisa West, insisted the jazz musician only lied on the phone because she thought her publicist, Dennis Byron, who she was having the conversation with, was trying to give a story to the media about Usher – who is married to his manager Grace Miguel – having an affair.

She claimed: “[Laura] didn’t want to be exploited and, in her attempt to deter Byron from doing so, she told him (inaccurately) that she never had protected sex with Usher and that she did not have herpes.”

She also added she is going to police because Laura thinks Byron was extorting her.

The musician previously accused the publicist of stalking her but on Friday a judge dismissed the matter due to a lack of evidence.

A number of people have taken legal action against the ‘Climax’ singer for allegedly putting them at risk of the sexually-transmitted infection after it emerged the ‘U Make Me Wanna’ hitmaker had paid a woman $1.1 million in 2012 to settle a lawsuit after she claimed to have contracted herpes from .

The settled 2012 suit claimed Usher had been diagnosed with herpes around 2009 or 2010, but he was accused of “consciously and purposefully” withholding his diagnosis from the unnamed woman and “continued to have unprotected sex” with her.