Billy Joel and Christie Brinkley released a joint statement today, shooting down rumors that their daughter Alexa Ray’s suicide attempt was Christie’s fault. Instead, they blamed Alexa’s break-up with her boyfriend Jimmy Riot for her problems. They said,

Every parent can imagine the pain and anguish we face as parents of a daughter who is working to recover from the dangerous actions she took while suffering a devastating heartbreak.

As much as we hate dignifying tabloid stories with a response, we feel we must set the record straight to protect our family. The story that ran in the New York Post on December 8th, and has been subsequently spread across the internet, is filled with vicious lies and attempts to smear our character and that of our beloved daughter.

We ask the public and legitimate media outlets to please ‘consider the source’ and to not further exacerbate our daughter’s situation by repeating and legitimizing these false reports.

When asked about Alexa’s condition the day after the incident, Jimmy told reporters that he hadn’t spoken to Alexa, so he didn’t know how she was doing.

The couple dated for several years, and according to a friend, Alexa had been upset because she was coming up on her one year anniversary of their break-up.