Black Madam: Amber Rose hired me for buttocks injections
PHILADELPHIA -- A Gothic hip-hop artist charged with killing a London break dancer with an illegal buttocks injection name-dropped her way through testimony Friday, claiming that one of the celebrities who sought her out became "a walking billboard" for her work.
Padge-Victoria Windslowe claimed model Amber Rose started receiving injections from her before she became famous and continued until two days before the 20-year-old dancer's 2011 death.
She said under cross-examination that Kanye West dropped Rose off for one procedure when the two were dating and that she was supposed to perform a "correction" on Nicki Minaj that never happened.
Representatives for Rose and Minaj did not immediately respond to emails requesting comment.
Windslowe, 45, talked of the dizzying array of names, addresses, careers and identities she has assumed in the 20 years she admits doing underground cosmetic surgery on the side.
Clients from rappers to strippers to fellow transgender women paid thousands to plump their posteriors, Windslowe said.
"Amber was like a walking billboard," she said of Rose, who was raised in Philadelphia. "She brought a lot of girls from VH1."
Asked by Assistant District Attorney Carlos Vega why they would choose an unlicensed practitioner over an L.A. plastic surgeon, Windslowe said, "I was the best, and I don't mean that to be cocky."
Her "Black Madam" moniker, she said, came from many lucrative years running an escort service employing male, female and transgender sex workers. She kept half their take.
"It's set up like a friendly date, but I'm not naive about what goes on," she said. "They're doing something. It's not just escorting."
She said she kept half their take and made good money. But she stopped after her father died in 2003 because she "didn't feel good about it anymore."
The names she used on bank cards and mail deliveries before and after Claudia Aderotimi's death included birth name Forrest Gordon, the more feminine Foreest Leona Gordon, and Foreest Leona Giordani.
"I thought it sounded like a movie star name, so I liked it," she said of the last name.
Windslowe is charged with third-degree murder. Aderotimi died after she was injected with low-grade silicone at Philadelphia airport hotel.
Doctors have told jurors during the two-week trial that the syringe hit a vein and sent silicone to the woman's lungs. Two other women testified they spent months in the hospital with similar injuries after visits with Windslowe, including one who received an injection on a dining room table at a "pumping party."
Defense lawyer David Rudenstein seemingly hoped to show jurors through Windslowe's testimony that she prepped them with alcohol before and after the injections and took other safety measures.
However, prosecutors say she mostly used nonsterile, industrial silicone, not the medical-grade silicone that is encased in implants during standard cosmetic surgeries.
"I told (clients) I've been doing this for years, I've done it to myself and my friends, and I was trained by a nurse up in Washington Heights (in New York City) back in 1995," Windslowe said Friday, explaining her credentials.
On the stand Thursday, Windslowe said she was trained by a doctor in Thailand and another in South America who performed her sex-change operation.
She said she started doing body sculpting two decades ago to help transgender friends. Transgender women often want to plump up an indent in the side of the buttocks they call "the boy pocket," she said.
Windslowe charged about $1,000 to $2,000 depending on the amount of silicone requested. Some clients, including a pole dancer she discussed Friday, saw her a half-dozen times.
Windslowe told jurors Thursday that she has worked on thousands of people, earning the title "the Michelangelo of buttocks injections," and uses the same products on herself.
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2/27/2015 4:42:50 PM (GMT -5:00)
