NY rap / hip-hop artist / actor Ja Rule was hit with a $4 million civil suit Mar. 14 in Ontario Superior Court, a week after he pleaded guilty to a criminal assault charge for a June 5, 2003 brawl inside Toronto's La Rouge nightclub.

After copping his plea on Mar. 7 and paying a $1,200 fine, Ja Rule apologized for the incident, in which he slugged a clubgoer who was taunting the rapper about his ongoing feud with 50 Cent. In return for his plea, prosecutors dropped the more serious charge of criminal assault.

Now, the 29-year-old Hip-hop rap star must square off with a local who says the hip-hop heavyweight hit the wrong man that night.

The plaintiff, Sandeep Grewal-Singh, of Brompton, Ontario, contends he sustained "severe physical and emotional shock to the system" and will be "permanently injured" from Rule's punch. According to his suit, Grewal-Singh "still feels nervous going out" as a result of the 2003 smackdown. He says he suffered "massive tearing, ripping and damage to his muscles, tendons, nerves, ligaments, blood vessels and skeletal structure" as a result of the fight.

Grewal-Singh also says he was not one of the people yelling obscenities at Rule, per court papers obtained by Canada's National Post. (That could be an important distinction, since the judge in Rule's criminal case, Justice W.P. Bassel, made a point of saying those who taunted Ja Rule were complicit; Bassel even apologized to Rule by calling those taunters who instigated the melee an "embarrassment" to the city of Toronto.)

Instead, Grewal-Singh claims he was an innocent bystander who was thrown to the ground and then down a flight of stairs by Ja Rule.

At the conclusion of the criminal case, Ja Rule's lawyer, Steven Skurka, told Reuters, "It was one punch to the eye of the victim who he believed was insulting him."

The rap artist, who had been in Canada filming a remake of Assault on Precinct 13 at the time of the brawl, could not be reached for comment on the lawsuit. Ja is scheduled to play a series of concerts in Germany later this month.

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