Actress Melissa Shuman attends the premiere of “Swimfan” at UCLA’s Sunset Canyon Recreation Center on August 19, 2002 in Westwood, California. (Robert Mora/Getty Images)Throughout the docuseries, allegations of sexual misconduct and assault range as far back as Nick Carter’s early aughts popstar days in the Backstreet Boys. But mostly the allegations in “Fallen Idols” come from former Dream girl band singer, Melissa Schuman.
Although Nick had shown interest in Schuman while she was in Dream, it wasn’t until she left the group to begin an acting career that they interacted. In 2003, both would go on to be in the horror film “The Hollow” when Schuman was 18 and Nick was in his early 20s. She said he invited her to hang out and play video games with friends, and Nick plied her and her underage friend with alcohol and then later sexually assaulted her. When she wanted to file a police report, she was persuaded not to because Nick allegedly had some of the best litigators in the country. Her former manager has now denied that she told him about the alleged assault.
A year later, she would go on to attempt to restart her music career as a solo artist. Her new management, who also worked with Nick, told her that she would have to do a duet with him, but after a chilly recording session, she claims she was dropped. Schuman said looking back now, “It feels almost premeditated, where it was presented as if it was going to actually help me, but in reality, it feels more like an alibi for him.”
Another woman named Ashley, who only shared her first name in the docuseries, was a former friend of Nick’s sister Angel. Ashley recalled three sexual encounters with Nick when she was 15 and he was 23 on the Carter family property in Florida. Similar to Schuman’s account, Ashley said she was plied with alcohol during each encounter. In 2003, Ashley went to the Florida police to file a report. However, Florida police did not prosecute the case because of conflicting accounts
At the end of the series, a third accuser Shannon “Shay” Ruth, came forward to allege that she also was assaulted by Nick. In 2001, when she was 17-year-old she met Nick after a Backstreet Boys concert. Ruth said that he invited her to his tour bus, plied her with alcohol and assaulted her in the bathroom. Ruth, who also has cerebral palsy and autism, said that Nick allegedly threatened her. “I remember afterward, I told him that I was gonna tell people everything he did, and he starts screaming at me, and he calls me a r******d b**h and he grabs my arm,” she said.