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Indicted hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs has been hit with yet another civil lawsuit, claiming that he repeatedly drugged and sexually assaulted an unnamed model over a four year period.
In a lawsuit filed Thursday in New York state court, the accuser – identified only as a Florida model under the pseudonym Jane Doe – says that Combs abused her on multiple occasions from 2020 to earlier this year, often after giving her drugs and using other coercive tactics.
The allegations from the woman – at least the twelfth victim to accuse Combs of sexual abuse of over the last year – echo claims made by federal prosecutors in a sweeping indictment unsealed last week, which detailed elaborate, drug-fueled “freak off” performances involving numerous victims.
“Combs would make her ‘perform a show’ for him and would ply her with alcohol and substances until she passed out,” her lawyers write. “Throughout the four years, defendant Combs would consistently pressure Jane Doe adding other men and women into the bedroom despite Jane Doe being clear that she did not want others involved.”
The accuser says Combs and others used “coercive and harassing language” to force her to agree to his demands, including making “threatening jokes” to her that caused her to “fear for her safety if she did not comply.” She says he and others even tracked her location and monitored her conversations.
At one point in 2022, the accuser says she became pregnant shortly after a sexual encounter with Combs. After she shared the news with Combs, her lawyers say one of his associates “harassed Jane Doe by repeatedly calling her and telling Jane Doe to have an abortion.” She says she later suffered a miscarriage.
Combs, also known as Puff Daddy and P. Diddy, was once one of the most powerful men in the music industry. But over the past year, he has faced a flood of civil abuse lawsuits, starting with a high-profile case filed late last year by his former longtime girlfriend Cassie Ventura. That case quickly settled, but it was later corroborated by a widely shared video of Combs assaulting her at a hotel, and it was followed by numerous other cases with similar allegations.
Then last week, federal prosecutors unveiled a sweeping indictment, accusing Combs of operating a criminal enterprise centered on a “pervasive pattern of abuse toward women.”
“For decades, Sean Combs … abused, threatened and coerced women and others around him to fulfill his sexual desires, protect his reputation and conceal his conduct,” reads the indictment, which was obtained by Billboard. “To do so, Combs relied on the employees, resources and the influence of his multi-faceted business empire that he led and controlled.”
Even after the criminal charges, new civil cases have continued to be filed. Earlier this week, a woman named Thalia Graves filed a case claiming that Combs and another man another man “viciously raped” her New York City studio in 2001 – and that they filmed the encounter.
Combs is currently behind bars after a federal judge refused to grant him bail, ruling that he would pose a flight risk and might seek to intimidate witnesses and victims if released. The criminal case is pending, with a trial likely still months away.
Canadian musician K’naan has been charged with sexual assault. A charge sheet was filed this morning (Sept. 26) in Quebec City for the musician and director, born Keinan Abdi Warsame, for a count of sexual assault dating back to 2010, The Canadian Press reports. The arrest warrant alleges that the assault took place between July 16 and 17 […]
With Sean “Diddy” Combs sitting in jail on federal sex trafficking and racketeering charges, he faces an uncertain path ahead in the immediate future — with unresolved issues over his detainment and how quickly he’ll face trial.
Combs, who was arrested and charged last week, stands accused of sweeping criminal wrongdoing, including physical abuse, forced labor, kidnapping, arson and bribery. If convicted on all the charges, he potentially faces a sentence of life in prison.
After Judge Andrew L. Carter denied him bail on the grounds that Combs posed a flight risk and might intimidate witnesses, the music mogul’s lead attorney Marc Agnifilo suggested he would appeal that ruling to a federal appeals court. But he has not yet filed that appeal, and such a challenge faces long odds.
Until then, Combs will likely remain at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn — a federal correctional facility that has long been criticized for danger and dysfunction. In July, one of New York’s U.S. Congressmen called for an investigation, citing “chronic understaffing, perpetual solitary confinement and widespread violence.” Last month, a federal judge criticized “dangerous, barbaric conditions” at the facility.
In court filings, Agnifilo has called the MDC “horrific” and “not fit for pre-trial detention,” and he suggested at last week’s bail hearing that he would seek to have Combs transferred elsewhere. But Judge Carter told him that decisions on pre-trial jail placement were not within his purview, and in a court filing on Monday, Agnifilo declined to formally ask the judge for a change in jails.
How long will the embattled mogul be waiting at MDC? That depends on when his trial takes place, which is a harder thing to predict than you might think.
Anyone accused of a crime in the U.S. has a constitutional right to a speedy trial, which in federal cases means a jury trial must start within 70 days. Defendants often waive that right to give their attorneys more time to prepare a defense, since prosecutors usually have a head start. But Agnifilo declined to do so last week, saying he was “going to do everything I can to move his case as quickly as possible.”
“I’m going to try and minimize the amount of time he spends in very, very difficult and, I believe, inhumane housing conditions,” Agnifilo said at a press conference on Wednesday.
The demand for a speedy trial suggests that Diddy’s legal team believes there is more advantage to be gained from forcing prosecutors to quickly put their case before a jury, rather than spending more time preparing themselves or attacking the charges with pre-trial motions. The move could allow the government less time to find additional witnesses, and less time to sift through huge amounts of digital records and other evidence. “They’re going to have to accommodate me and him and give us a quick trial, and I’m going to be pushing for that,” Agnifilo said.
But prosecutors can, and very likely will, seek to slow down that timetable.
Under speedy trial rules, the judge can “exclude” certain time from the 70-day timer for a wide variety of reasons. Already, Judge Carter has said in court orders that he will exclude several weeks of time — starting with the Sept. 18 bail hearing and running to the next hearing next month — “in the interest of justice.” The next court date is a status conference currently scheduled for Oct. 9.
Another cause for delay would be if prosecutors filed so-called superseding indictments — an updated version of the case against Diddy. Such a filing could simply add new charges against Diddy based on newly-discovered evidence or testimony, or it could add new defendants to the case — not an unlikely outcome in a case that repeatedly references unnamed co-conspirators in Diddy’s alleged criminal enterprise.
At a press conference announcing the charges, U.S. Attorney Damian Williams suggested that could be exactly what prosecutors are planning. “I can’t take anything off the table,” Williams said. “Anything is possible. Our investigation is very active and ongoing.”
Less than a week after he was indicted on sex trafficking and racketeering charges, Sean “Diddy” Combs is facing yet another civil sexual abuse case, this time claiming that he and another man “viciously raped” a woman at his New York City studio in 2001.
In a complaint filed Tuesday in Manhattan federal court, attorneys for Thalia Graves say that Combs and his head of security, Joseph Sherman, isolated her, drugged her and sexually assaulted her at his studio. The lawsuit says the rapper also filmed the attack and later showed it to others.
“For decades, she remained silent and did not report the crime out of fear that defendants would use their power to ruin her life, as they had repeatedly, explicitly threatened to do,” writes Graves’ lawyers, who include well-known attorney Gloria Allred. “To this day, plaintiff suffers from severe depression, anxiety, and panic attacks, and still lives in fear of defendants.”
The case is the latest of at least nine similar civil suits filed against Combs over the past year, each of which accuses him of sexual abuse and other wrongdoing. And it comes just a week after he was arrested and indicted by federal prosecutors on sweeping accusations of sex trafficking and racketeering – charges that, if proven, could see him sent to prison for life.
In the new case, Graves claims she was 25 years old at the time of the attack. She says she was dating one of Combs’ employees, and that he exploited the relationship to “lure” her into meeting him and Sherman alone at the studio.
Once alone, Graves alleges they gave her a drink that was “likely laced with a drug that eventually caused her briefly to lose consciousness.” She says she later “awoke to find herself bound and restrained,” at which time the pair “proceeded to brutally sexually abuse” her. Her attorneys say that “both men were undeterred by plaintiff’s cries for help throughout the attack.”
A representative for Combs did not immediately return a request for comment. Sherman could not immediately be located for comment.
Following the attack, Graves says she “never recovered,” suffering suicidal thoughts and other severe emotional damage. And she says any progress in healing was “dramatically reversed” when she learned last year that Combs had filmed the alleged attack and had “shown the video to multiple men.”
“Plaintiff could not believe that Defendants would record themselves committing such a gruesome crime and then proceed proudly and widely to disseminate the recording of it,” her attorneys write. “This action seeks redress for defendants’ brutalizing, misogynistic, and violent attacks.”
Singer Al B. Sure! has waded into the Sean “Diddy” Combs legal morass by calling for official action to be taken against the team that created what he referred to as a new “fake” memoir credited to his ex-wife — and Combs’ longtime girlfriend — Kim Porter. Kim’s Lost Words: A Journey for Justice From the Other Side… was released on Amazon on Sept. 6, a week before Combs was arrested and indicted on sex trafficking and racketeering charges, and it allegedly contains information Porter saved on a flash drive and gave to friends before her sudden death in 2018 at age 47 from lobar pneumonia.
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“For over a decade and a half, I’ve been posting about, and tagging random law enforcement agencies in hopes to protect loved ones, avoid deaths & tragedies that could have all been avoided,” wrote Sure, 56, born Albert Joseph Brown, in an Instagram post on Monday (Sept. 23) that featured hashtags for a raft of law enforcement agencies. The singer-songwriter added that he had been “ignored” and ridiculed.”
Sure claimed that an alleged effort to silence him was meant to prevent the singer from sharing “facts and insights” he said Porter told him during “frequent and intimate conversations.” Sure and Porter were married from 1989 to 1990 and had a son, Quincy Brown, 33, whom Combs later adopted when the child was 3-years-old.
Sure’s posts also included what he said were allegedly stolen notes that he claimed were intended to be included in Porter’s memoir, as well as claims that his late ex’s devices have gone missing as further proof of what he deemed an alleged cover-up about the facts surrounding her death, which he called a “tragic murder.”
“Ms. Porter’s missing devices, allegedly already in evidence, unquestionably contain the critical evidence that have been concealed,” he claimed. “I’m convinced that evidence corroborates closely with details outlined in the recently released public indictment document.”
Sure alleged that that “Kimberly was allegedly taken from us because she was set on course to accomplish what Mrs. Cassie Ventura did by igniting the Bon Fire [sic] which brings us here today,” appearing to make a connection between Porter’s death and a settlement last year between Combs and former girlfriend singer Cassie Ventura. A day after Ventura sued Combs for what she alleged were years of physical and emotional abuse and rape, the pair reached an undisclosed settlement.
The series of posts from Sure also included excerpts from the 59-page book published by Los Angeles producer Chris Todd under the pen name Jamal T. Millwood.
In a statement to Billboard on Tuesday (Sept. 24), Combs’ attorney Erica Wolf wrote, “The Kim Porter ‘memoir’ is fake. It is also offensive – a shameless attempt to profit from tragedy. Chris Todd has no respect for Ms. Porter or her family, who deserve better. … It is an established fact that Ms. Porter died of natural causes. May she rest in peace.”
Porter was found dead at her Toluca Lake, Calif., home in 2018 after suffering from what was described as days of “flu-like” symptoms. The coroner initially listing her cause of death as “deferred,” then later changing it to to lobar pneumonia, a type of pneumonia characterized by infection and/or inflammation of one or more lobes of a patient’s lungs.
Ventura is one of at least eight people who have sued Combs, alleging sexual abuse. The Bad Boy Records founder was arrested on Sept. 16 in New York on an indictment charging him with a racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking and transportation for purposes of prostitution, charges Combs has pleaded not guilty to. The disgraced music mogul, who has denied the allegations against him, has been denied bail twice and will remain behind bars awaiting his trial date.
Rolling Stone reported that author Todd (aka Millwood, born Todd Christopher Guzze), told the publication that he cannot guarantee that the claims in the No. 1 bestselling book are authentic, saying he received the flash drive allegedly containing the notes from two unnamed “music industry” sources. The magazine notes that the book contains “numerous typos, factual inaccuracies and incredulous claims involving high-profile names,” adding that two of Porter’s friends, Kimora Lee Simmons and Lawanda Lane, told the magazine that they “don’t know [the author] at all.”
“If somebody put my feet to the fire and they said, ‘Life or death, is that book real?’ I have to say I don’t know. But it’s real enough to me,” Todd told RS. “Maybe not 100% of the book is true, but maybe 80% is.”
Sure ended his posts by noting that he was on good terms with Porter near the end of her life and that they had friendly conversations until just a few days before her death. “We must continue to advocate for justice and ensure that everyone of the individuals who conspired against her are held accountable and prosecuted to the highest extent of the law,” he wrote.
Combs and Porter dated on-and-off for 13 years until 2017, and they had three children together: son Christian Combs and twins Jessie and D’Lila Combs.
This is The Legal Beat, a weekly newsletter about music law from Billboard Pro, offering you a one-stop cheat sheet of big new cases, important rulings and all the fun stuff in between.
This week: Nelly faces a copyright lawsuit over his decades-old album Country Grammar; T.I. and his wife Tiny win a shocking $71 million jury verdict against a toymaker; the Michael Jackson estate takes legal action against a sexual abuse accuser; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: A Legal Blast From The Past
Nearly a quarter century after Nelly’s breakout album, he’s now getting sued over it – and by his childhood friends, no less. The case, filed by members of his early-career St. Lunatics group, claims that Nelly (Cornell Haynes) “manipulated” them into thinking they’d be paid for their work on the 2000 album Country Grammar, but that he ultimately cut them out of the credits and the royalty payments. “Every time plaintiffs confronted defendant Haynes [he] would assure them as ‘friends’ he would never prevent them from receiving the financial success they were entitled to,” the lawsuit reads. “Unfortunately, plaintiffs, reasonably believing that their friend and former band member would never steal credit for writing the original compositions, did not initially pursue any legal remedies.” Copyright lawsuits over years-old songs have become a common sight in the music industry over the past decade, thanks largely to a Supreme Court ruling that said such cases were mostly fair game. But the plaintiffs in the current case – which is styled as an infringement lawsuit but appears to really be more of a dispute over ownership – could still face hurdles over their long delay. To understand why, go read our full story on the lawsuit, with access to the actual lawsuit filed against Nelly.
Other top stories this week…
NOT A TINY VERDICT – T.I. and his wife Tameka “Tiny” Harris won a stunning $71 million jury verdict in their lawsuit claiming that toymaker MGA stole the design of a line of “O.M.G.” toy dolls from their real-life teen pop group OMG Girlz. Following a three-week trial, a jury found that MGA infringed both the trade dress and the likeness rights of the OMG Girlz — a defunct trio created by Tiny featuring her daughter Zonnique “Star” Pullins. JACKSON ESTATE ACTION – Michael Jackson’s estate filed an arbitration case against a man who it claims has threatened to resurface ugly abuse allegations ahead of the upcoming release of Michael, a biopic about the King of Pop. According to the estate, the accuser signed a never-before-reported settlement in 2020 that saw him paid $3.3 million in return for signing a non-disclosure agreement, but now he’s threatening to breach the deal if he’s not paid another $213 million. DIDDY STAYS IN JAIL – Sean “Diddy” Combs was once again refused bail in his sex abuse case, after a federal judge ruled that the indicted rapper and music executive would pose a flight risk and might intimidate witnesses if released. His lawyers renewed their request to let him await trial on sex trafficking and racketeering charges under house arrest at his Miami mansion, but Judge Andrew L. Carter ruled Diddy must instead wait for the trial in a Brooklyn federal prison. REASONABLE DOUBT? Raise your hand if you had “Jay-Z argues with New York City over arcane issues of intellectual property law” on your 2024 bingo card. With a court-ordered auction of Damon Dash’s stake in Roc-A-Fella Records looming, lawyers for the superstar and the city are somehow now wrangling over whether he can use copyright termination to retake control of his debut album Reasonable Doubt. That’s a crucial question for anyone who wants to buy Dash’s stake in Roc-A-Fella – and for a municipal government that’s trying to use the auction to recoup hundreds of thousands of dollars in unpaid child support. DOLAN CASE TOSSED – A federal judge dismissed a lawsuit accusing Madison Square Garden executive James Dolan of pressuring a masseuse into unwanted sex while his band toured with the Eagles, ruling that his accuser had failed to meet the requirements of a federal sex trafficking law. But the case, which also includes simpler, state-law allegations of sexual battery and aiding and abetting of sexual assault, will likely be refiled in state court. SPICE SETTLEMENT – Ice Spice reached an agreement to end a copyright lawsuit over allegations that her recent hit “In Ha Mood” was copied from an earlier track called “In That Mood” by a Brooklyn rapper named D.Chamberz (Duval Chamberlain). Terms of the apparent settlement were not disclosed in court filings. MANILOW BATTLE – Hipgnosis Songs Fund, one of the most influential players in the catalog acquisition market run-up of recent years, is locked in litigation with Barry Manilow – a two-way, trans-Atlantic legal battle that sheds light on the company’s 2020 deal to buy the singer’s royalty income. Billboard’s Elizabeth Dilts Marshall dove deep into the court filings and breaks it all down here.
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T.I. and his wife Tameka “Tiny” Harris won a stunning $71 million jury verdict Monday in their lawsuit claiming that toymaker MGA stole the design of a line of “O.M.G.” toy dolls from their real-life teen pop group OMG Girlz.
As first reported by Law360, jurors awarded the couple and their companies the huge award after finding that MGA’s dolls infringed both the trade dress and the likeness rights of the OMG Girlz — a defunct musical trio created by Tiny and featuring her daughter Zonnique “Star” Pullins.
Following a three-week trial and a day of deliberations, the jurors awarded the rapper and his wife $17.9 million in actual damages and another $53.6 million in punitive damages. Neither side immediately returned requests for comment.
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The legal battle began in 2021, with T.I. (real name Clifford Harris) and Tiny claiming that MGA had committed both “cultural appropriation and outright theft of the intellectual property” by stealing the look of a group of “young multicultural women.”
Their complaint against MGA included side-by-side images, aiming to show how each OMG doll was directly based on a particular member of the OMG Girlz – Pullins, Bahja “Beauty” Rodriguez, and Breaunna “Babydoll” Womack.
MGA maintained that it had done nothing wrong — that the dolls were more often branded as L.O.L. Surprise! O.M.G., and that consumers would not confuse the toys for the “short-lived” band.
Over three years of litigation, the case already went to trial twice. The first trial, in January 2023, ended in a mistrial after jurors heard inadmissible testimony featuring accusations of racism against MGA. The second trial then ended in a verdict for MGA, with jurors clearing the company of wrongdoing. But that verdict was later overturned on appeal, setting the stage for yet another trial.
On the third try, the outcome swung in favor of T.I. and Tiny. In a livestream on Instagram following the verdict, she said it had been “a hell of a fight” but that “we couldn’t be more happy.”
“We wanted to thank the jurors for just seeing us through this, and just believing in what we said,” she said in the video. “They heard our story and they knew we wasn’t lying. It’s amazing.”
MGA can still appeal the verdict and the damages award, first by asking the judge to set them aside and then by taking the case to a federal appeals court.
Ice Spice has reached an agreement to end a copyright lawsuit over allegations that her recent hit “In Ha Mood” was copied from a Brooklyn rapper’s earlier track.
The case, filed earlier this year by a rapper named D.Chamberz (Duval Chamberlain), claimed that Ice Spice’s song – which spent 16 weeks on the Hot 100 in 2023 – was “strikingly similar” to his own 2021 track “In That Mood.”
But in a motion filed in federal court Friday, attorneys for both sides said they had agreed to resolve the lawsuit. Specific terms of the deal were not disclosed in court filings, and neither side immediately returned requests for comment.
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Released early last year following Ice Spice’s 2022 breakout, “In Ha Mood” reached No. 58 on the Hot 100 and No. 18 on the US Hot R&B/Hip Hop Songs chart. It was later included on her debut EP Like..?, and she performed the song during her October appearance as the musical guest on Saturday Night Live.
In a lawsuit filed in January, D.Chamberz claimed that the two songs share so many similarities that the overlaps “cannot be purely coincidental.” He said the similar elements “go [to] the core of each work,” and are so obvious that they’ve already been spotted by listeners.
“By every method of analysis, ‘In Ha Mood’ is a forgery,” D.Chamberz’s attorneys wrote at the time. “Any proper comparative analysis of the beat, lyrics, hook, rhythmic structure, metrical placement, and narrative context will demonstrate that ‘In Ha Mood’ was copied.”
The lawsuit claimed the earlier song received “significant airplay” on New York City radio stations, including Hot 97 and Power 105.1, giving Ice Spice and others behind her track a chance to hear it.
In addition to naming Ice Spice (Isis Naija Gaston) as a defendant, the lawsuit also names her frequent producer, RiotUSA (Ephrem Lopez, Jr.), as well as Universal Music Group, Capitol Records and 10K Projects.
In April, the defendants formally denied the lawsuit’s allegations, but the case remained in the earliest stages when Friday’s agreement was reached.
Attorneys for Jay-Z are now sparring with lawyers for New York City over whether he can use copyright termination to retake control of his debut album Reasonable Doubt – a crucial question ahead of court-ordered auction of Roc-A-Fella Records co-founder Damon Dash’s one-third stake in the label.
The city’s child services agency, which wants to collect the more than $193,000 that Dash owes in unpaid child support, warned a federal judge in court filings last week that Jay-Z was using “false” threats of an approaching termination to drive down the price of Dash’s stake in his company.
“Jay-Z’s statements to the press have poisoned the environment for the auction,” wrote Gerald Singleton, an attorney for the city. “Those statements are false and extremely damaging to the City’s interests in ensuring that the auction will generate sufficient funds to satisfy all existing child support arrearages and secure future child support payments.”
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But on Monday, longtime Jay-Z lawyer Alex Spiro fired right back on behalf of Roc-A-Fella, saying neither the rapper nor his company had issued any such statements and that there was “no merit to NYC’s accusations.” But he also confirmed that Jay-Z was in fact seeking to use termination to take back the album, Reasonable Doubt, in 2031 – and that prospective buyers could make up their own minds about what that means.
“Potential bidders have every right to assess whether they believe the notice of termination would be effective in 2031,” Spiro told the judge.
As early as next month, the U.S. Marshals Service will sell off Dash’s 33.3% interest in Roc-A-Fella Inc., an entity whose only real asset is the sound recording copyright to Reasonable Doubt. Though the court-ordered auction was originally intended to pay off an $823,000 judgment in a civil lawsuit, New York City jumped into the case over Dash’s child support debt. The state of New York later did the same, claiming Dash owes more than $8.7 million in back taxes and penalties.
The owners of the other two-thirds of Roc-A-Fella — label co-founders Jay-Z (Shawn Carter) and Kareem “Biggs” Burke — have already attempted to stop the auction, including making changes to the company’s bylaws and intervening in the lawsuit. But a federal judge rejected such opposition in February, and the sale could take place as early as Oct. 21.
As the auction approaches, a minimum purchase price has been set at $3 million. But it has remained unclear what exactly a potential winner would be buying.
Streaming and other royalties from Reasonable Doubt would likely provide a buyer with a revenue stream; since its 1996 release, the album has racked up 2.2 million equivalent album units in the U.S., according to Luminate, including 21,500 units so far this year. But the eventual buyer also would be a minority owner in a company controlled by hostile partners, with little ability to perform typical due diligence on the asset they’re about to purchase.
Another key question mark for buyers – and the source of this week’s dispute with NYC – is just how long Roc-A-Fella will continue to own its only real asset.
The termination right, a provision created by congress in the 1970s, empowers authors to reclaim ownership of copyrighted works decades after selling them away. If Jay is eligible for it, termination would allow him to win back the rights to his sound recording of Reasonable Doubt roughly 35 years after he released the album, meaning 2031.
But in their court filing on Friday, attorneys for New York City child services said Jay-Z was not, in fact, eligible for termination. They argued that he had created the album as so-called “work for hire” under a written contract with Roc-A-Fella – meaning the company had always been the legal owner of the copyright, and there were no rights to Jay to take back in the first place.
“He has claimed that he has a termination right under the Copyright Act and that the rights to Reasonable Doubt will revert to him in six years,” wrote Singleton, the NYC attorney. “In fact, he has no such termination right and RAF is entitled to the renewal term [and] will own the copyright rights until the year 2098.”
To address the problem, the city asked the judge to issue a definitive ruling on whether Jay-Z is eligible for termination – and to postpone the auction until he does so.
But in his response Monday, Spiro argued that the city “has no right to seek such a ruling.” He said the demand was premature, since Jay-Z will not formally take back the album until 2031, and that a city agency had no legal standing to raise such questions in court.
“Put simply, this is not the appropriate time, forum, or case to litigate any issues relating to Jay-Z’s notice of termination,” Spiro wrote. “This Court should therefore reject NYC’s request for an impermissible advisory opinion as to the effectiveness of Jay-Z’s notice of termination.”
Michael Jackson’s estate has filed a legal action against a man who it claims has threatened to resurface ugly abuse allegations ahead of the upcoming release of a biopic about the King of Pop, according to multiple media reports.
As detailed by both the Washington Informer and the Financial Times on Friday, Jackson’s estate has filed a private arbitration case against the unnamed accuser, claiming his alleged threats violate an earlier, never-before-reported settlement over the abuse accusations.
In the arbitration case, the estate reportedly alleges that the earlier settlement — struck in 2020 — saw the accuser paid $3.3 million in return for signing a non-disclosure agreement. But the estate reportedly claims he’s now threatening to breach the agreement if he’s not paid another $213 million.
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In an interview with the Informer, estate executor John Branca reportedly said: “The associate’s lawyer even said to us, ‘If you don’t meet our demands, we’re going to have to share these allegations with a wider group of people.’ It was a shakedown. Enough is enough.”
The name of Jackson’s accuser and the details of his supposed allegations were not disclosed in media reports. It’s unclear when the arbitration case was filed, or what exactly it alleges. The Jackson estate would not confirm the accuracy of the reports and declined to comment on the matter.
The article from the Financial Times reported that the Jackson estate had also referred the matter to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Los Angeles. A spokesman for that office did not immediately return a request for comment from Billboard.
The threats to go public come as the Jackson estate prepares for the premiere of Michael, a movie about the singer’s life starring his nephew Jaafar Jackson in the titular role. The biopic, directed by Antoine Fuqua, is set for release in April 2025.
Jackson, who died suddenly in 2009, was never convicted or held legally liable on any accusation of child molestation, but is still dogged by such allegations. Two men, Wade Robson and James Safechuck, continue to claim Jackson sexually abused them as children, spending the last decade pursuing civil lawsuits. And their allegations were amplified in 2019 by HBO docuseries Leaving Neverland, which laid out their claims in disturbing detail.
The Jackson estate has always vehemently denied all such claims, pointing out that the singer was acquitted in a 2005 criminal trial and arguing that his accusers are simply seeking monetary gain from an artist who cannot defend himself because defamation law does not extend to dead individuals.
Shortly before Leaving Neverland aired, the estate sued HBO over the series, claiming that “Michael Jackson is innocent. Period.” The case claimed the network had breached a decades-old contract that it signed to air a Jackson concert back in 1992, which included a provision banning HBO from making “any disparaging remarks” about the singer.
That lawsuit was eventually sent to private arbitration in 2019, where it remains pending. The status of such arbitration cases, similar to the one reported on Friday, are intentionally kept more private than traditional litigation and are difficult to ascertain from public records.