Legal
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Live Nation CEO Michael Rapino must be deposed in the ongoing litigation over the 2021 disaster at the Astroworld music festival, the Texas Supreme Court says.
In a ruling last week, the high court denied Live Nation’s petition seeking to stop the deposition, rejecting its arguments that victims were simply seeking to depose the executive in order to “harass Live Nation and to coerce settlements.”
The Oct. 15 ruling, which left in place a trial judge’s decision this summer forcing Rapino to testify, came nearly three years after the 2021 incident, in which a crowd crush during Travis Scott’s headlining set left 10 dead and hundreds injured.
The disaster spawned hundreds of lawsuits against Live Nation, Scott and others, collectively seeking billions of dollars in damages. Many of those cases have since settled on private terms, but some victims are still moving toward a jury trial. A so-called bellwether trial had been scheduled to start this week but was pushed back to February after more settlements were reached.
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In seeking to block Rapino’s deposition, Live Nation’s attorneys argued that he was the kind of top-level “apex” executive who can’t typically be dragged into court cases. They said he was far removed from actual decision-making and was “not involved in the festival”, meaning he didn’t have any unique information for the lawsuit that couldn’t be gleaned from other sources.
“Mr. Rapino’s only connection to the festival was as Live Nation’s ultimate executive,” the company’s lawyers wrote. “Any knowledge he may possess was obtained from others who have knowledge superior to his own.”
But attorneys for victims argued that Rapino had played a more direct role in the operations of Astroworld than Live Nation was letting on. Among other evidence, they cited an email Rapino sent on the night of the disaster, instructing Live Nation’s festival director to wait for more information about the death toll before canceling the rest of the festival. “If 5 died we would cancel,” he wrote in the message.
“Remarkably, Live Nation claims that Rapino was not the decisionmaker on whether to cancel the Festival,” the lawyers for the victims wrote. “This email proves otherwise, and plaintiffs want an opportunity to examine Rapino about it.”
Following last week’s ruling, it’s unclear when Rapino’s deposition will take place. A spokesperson for Live Nation did not immediately return a request for comment on the court’s order.
A Georgia judge is weighing whether to declare a mistrial in Young Thug’s long-running Atlanta gang trial, a move that would require prosecutors to either start from scratch or drop a case that has already lasted more than two years.
The motion for a mistrial was sparked by an incident Wednesday (Oct. 23) in which a state’s witness accidentally revealed sensitive information to the jury. Defense attorneys said the mistake was caused by prosecutor missteps, and the judge quickly chided government lawyers for “sloppiness.”
A mistrial would mean an abrupt end to a criminal trial that has stretched across 10 months of jury selection and 11 months of testimony to become the longest-ever in state history. Prosecutors have meandered through a vast list of witnesses, and the case has been beset by unusual delays — including a jailhouse stabbing of one defendant and a bizarre episode over a secret meeting that saw the presiding judge removed from the case.
Since taking over the case this summer, Judge Paige Reese Whitaker has expressed frustration with how the Fulton County District Attorney’s office has been handling the case. Last month, she blasted the prosecutors for “poor lawyering, “baffling” decisions and steps to repeatedly “hide the ball” amid a “haphazard” trial.
At Wednesday’s hearing, Whitaker refused outright to declare a mistrial with prejudice, which would have permanently ended the case. But she said she would consider doing so without prejudice, meaning prosecutors could attempt to retry their case from scratch in front of a new jury.
The specter of such an outcome has prompted prosecutors to discuss plea deals. According to X posts by Cath Russon, managing editor at Law&Crime, each defense team was set to meet individually on Thursday with District Attorney Fani Willis to discuss potential deals.
As a result of the negotiations and the pending mistrial motions, all trial proceedings before Whitaker on Thursday (Oct. 24) and Friday (Oct. 25) have been postponed and the trial is currently scheduled to resume on Monday morning (Oct. 28), according to Russon.
Thug (Jeffery Williams), a chart-topping rapper and producer who helped shape the sound of hip-hop over the past decade, was indicted in May 2022 along with dozens of others over allegations that his “YSL” was not really a record label called “Young Stoner Life” but rather a violent Atlanta gang called “Young Slime Life.” The case, built around Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) law, claims the group committed murders, carjackings, armed robberies, drug dealing and other crimes over the course of a decade.
While the slow-moving trial has dragged on, Thug has been sitting in jail for more than two years, repeatedly denied bond over fears that he might intimidate witnesses. If the judge grants a mistrial and prosecutors decide to retry their case, he could have years more in jail until a verdict is reached. Such an outcome could potentially motivate defendants, too, to consider a negotiated resolution.
The Wednesday incident that sparked the calls for a mistrial took place as prosecutors were questioning a witness named Wunnie Lee (aka Slimelife Shawty), a former defendant in the YSL case who signed a plea agreement in exchange for testifying.
While on the stand, prosecutors asked Lee to identify certain defendants by showing him social media posts. While reading one of the posts, Lee read aloud the hashtag #freequa — a reference to a previous prison sentence for Marquavius Huey (aka Qua), one of Thug’s current co-defendants.
That was a crucial error by prosecutors. The jury was not supposed to know which defendants had previously been incarcerated, and defense attorneys argued that the government was supposed to redact the post and prep Lee not to mention it. After the admission before jurors, defense attorneys quickly moved for a mistrial.
“We’re not going to be able to unring this bell,” defense attorney Nicole Westmoreland said in court. “It is painfully obvious that the state is not prepping their witnesses.”
The misstep quickly drew another sharp critique from Judge Whitaker, who attempted to reach a solution that would allow the case to move forward: “What I’m trying to do is fix your sloppiness so that everybody won’t have wasted 10 to 12 months of their lives in this trial.”
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: 2 Live Crew wins a trial to take back control of its music catalog; Young Thug’s attorney wins a decision overturning his criminal contempt conviction; Diddy faces ever more accusations of sexual abuse; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: Termination Determination
2 Live Crew won a rare courtroom showdown over copyright law’s “termination right” — a crucial federal provision that allows songwriters and artists to take back the rights to their music decades after they sold them away to a company.
Termination has been at the heart of recent lawsuits involving Cher, Brian Wilson and Dwight Yoakam, and both Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment faced class actions from artists pushing to take back their music en masse. Jay-Z recently invoked termination to win back his debut album, and it was also the core issue behind a new “landmark” copyright rule issued last year about who gets paid streaming royalties.
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2 Live’s dispute kicked off in 2020 when Uncle Luke (Luther Campbell) and the heirs of two co-members invoked termination against Lil Joe Records, which bought the band’s catalog out of bankruptcy in the 1990s. The label fought back by suing the group in federal court, arguing that termination didn’t apply to the five albums at issue in the case.
Such disputes rarely reach a jury. But at a trial earlier this month, attorneys for Lil Joe argued that the protections of the bankruptcy sale had trumped any termination rights held by the members. 2 Live’s attorneys told a different story — one of “deceit and dishonesty” by Lil Joe’s owner that “wouldn’t be out of place in a Netflix movie.”
In their verdict, the jurors sided with 2 Live, allowing them to regain much of their catalog. Go read our entire story here to find out more.
Other top stories this week…
CONTEMPT CLEARED – Georgia’s Supreme Court sided with Brian Steel, an attorney serving as lead counsel to Young Thug in the rapper’s never-ending Atlanta gang trial, and reversed a ruling earlier this year that had held him in contempt of court. The decision will close a bizarre chapter in which Judge Ural Glanville sentenced Steel to 20 days in prison for refusing to reveal how he’d learned of a secret meeting between the judge and prosecutors — an incident that later saw Glanville removed from the case. But it won’t end the trial, which is already the longest in Georgia state history and has no end in sight.
PHOTOG STRIKES AGAIN – The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame was hit with a lawsuit over allegations that the museum illegally displayed a copyrighted image of Van Halen snapped by veteran rock photographer Neil Zlozower. If that name sounds familiar, it should: Zlozower has filed more than fifty such lawsuits over the past decade, including cases against Universal Music Group, Spotify, Ticketmaster, Mötley Crüe and many others.
GOING HOME – Demetrius “Big Meech” Flenory — a convicted drug trafficker and money-launderer involved in the early careers of rappers Jeezy and T.I. — was released from prison and will serve the remainder of his decades-long sentence in a halfway house. The rise and fall of Meech’s gang has been chronicled in 50 Cent’s Starz series BMF, on which Flenory’s son plays his father.
ALWAYS MORE DIDDY – Since you last heard from Legal Beat a week ago, there have three big developments in the story of Sean “Diddy” Combs, who currently stands accused of decades of sexual abuse:
Combs was hit with another wave of six civil lawsuits, including several alleging assaults as late as 2022 and one claiming he assaulted a 13-year-old girl. The cases were the latest from two attorneys who had already filed six such lawsuits and warned earlier this month that they represent at least 120 other alleged victims.
The new cases prompted Combs’ lawyer to ask the judge overseeing his criminal case to issue a gag order that would bar alleged victims and their attorneys from issuing “extrajudicial statements” about Combs to the press, arguing that such statements are threatening his right to a fair trial.
Separately in the criminal case, the Combs team demanded a court order forcing the government to reveal the names of his alleged sexual abuse victims, arguing he cannot fairly defend himself without knowing their identities: “The government is forcing him, unfairly, to play a guessing a game.”
RAP SCION ARRESTED – T.I.‘s 20-year-old son Clifford “King” Harris Jr. was arrested in Georgia on an open warrant stemming from 2022 charges of speeding, driving with a suspended license and DUI. The incident was sparked when King almost hit a police car as he was pulling out of a gas station; the officers reported that they smelled cannabis when they approached his car and that he was found with a gun on his hip.
Young Thug’s attorney Brian Steel has won a ruling at the Georgia Supreme Court overturning a trial judge’s controversial decision to hold the lawyer in criminal contempt earlier this year amid the rapper’s ongoing Atlanta gang trial.
In a decision Tuesday, the state’s top court reversed Judge Ural Glanville’s June contempt ruling, in which he had sentenced Steel to 20 days in jail for refusing to reveal how he’d learned of a secret meeting between the judge and prosecutors – an incident that later saw Glanville removed from the case.
Given that Glanville’s presence at the secret meeting was directly involved in the dispute with Steel, the Supreme Court ruled that he should have recused himself and allowed another judge to decide the attorney’s fate.
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“The exchange between Steel and Judge Glanville makes clear that Judge Glanville was involved in the controversy,” the high court wrote in its ruling. “For these reasons, a different judge should have presided over the contempt hearing, and the failure to do so requires reversal.”
Thug (Jeffery Williams) and dozens of others were indicted in May 2022 over allegations that his “YSL” was not really a record label called “Young Stoner Life” but rather a violent Atlanta gang called “Young Slime Life.” Citing Georgia’s Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) law, prosecutors claim the group operated a criminal enterprise that committed murders, carjackings, armed robberies, drug dealing and other crimes over the course of a decade.
Months into the massive trial, Steel alerted Judge Glanville in early June that he had learned of a secret “ex parte” meeting that morning between the judge, prosecutors and a witness named Kenneth Copeland. Steel argued that such a meeting, without defense counsel present, had potentially involved coercion of a witness and was clear grounds for a mistrial.
Rather than address Steel’s complaints, Glanville instead repeatedly demanded that he divulge who had informed him about a private meeting in his chambers, suggesting the leak was illegal: “If you don’t tell me how you got this information, you and I are going to have problems.”
When Steel refused to comply, Glanville held him in contempt and sentenced him to 20 days to be served over ten consecutive weekends. After Steel filed an appeal, the Supreme Court put the sentence on pause until it was able issue its decision.
Glanville argued that the ex parte meeting had been entirely proper and repeatedly refused requests to step down from the case. But in July, after he referred the case to another judge, Glanville was ordered to step aside over concerns about how the incident would impact the “public’s confidence in the judicial system.”
The bizarre episode, which resulted in weeks-long delay before Judge Paige Reese Whitaker took over, was just one of many slow-downs in a trial that is already the longest in Georgia state history. It took an unprecedented 10-month process just to pick a jury, and the case has also been halted by the stabbing of another defendant and other unusual events.
While the slow-moving trial has dragged on, Thug has been sitting in jail for more than two years, repeatedly denied bond by both judges to handle the case over fears that he might intimidate witnesses. Prosecutors have only presented part of their vast list of potential witnesses, and the trial is expected to run well into 2025.
Last month, Whitaker appeared to reach her wits’ end with the prosecutors trying the case — complaining of “poor lawyering, “baffling” decisions and steps to repeatedly “hide the ball” amid a “haphazard” trial: “I don’t know if I can stress any more than I already have how much the state’s lawyers need to make an effort to be upfront and forthright in the trial of this case.”
Sean “Diddy” Combs was hit with another wave of six civil abuse lawsuits late Sunday, including several cases alleging attacks as late as 2022 and one claiming he sexually assaulted a 13-year-old girl.
Filed by anonymous Jane Doe and John Doe plaintiffs, the lawsuits are the latest from attorneys Andrew Van Arsdale and Tony Buzbee, who filed six other cases against Combs last week and warned earlier this month that they represent at least 120 such alleged victims.
In one case, a Los Angeles businessman says Combs exposed himself and groped him during a 2022 promotional event for his Ciroc vodka brand. In another, a musical artist says the rapper drugged and raped her at a 2022 party in New York City. In yet another, a personal trainer says the star similarly dosed him and forced him to engage in repeated sex acts during a 2022 awards after party.
“While in and out of consciousness, individuals at the party forced plaintiff into sexual acts with both men and woman,” the lawsuit reads. “Plaintiff’s physical disposition made it impossible for him to reject their advances or otherwise control his body. These individuals, including Combs, essentially passed Plaintiff’s drugged body around like a party favor for their sexual enjoyment.”
In the most shocking allegation, one case alleges that Combs “drugged and raped a thirteen year-old girl at a house party,” an incident that allegedly followed the 2000 MTV Video Music Awards and took place in the presence of other unnamed celebrities who also participated in the assault.
A representative for Combs did not immediately return a request for comment on the new cases. In a previous statement on Buzbee’s earlier suits, his legal team said he has “never sexually assaulted anyone” and that he has “full confidence in the facts, their legal defenses, and the integrity of the judicial process.”
Once one of the most powerful men in the music industry, Combs has faced a flood of abuse accusations over the past year, starting with a bombshell civil case from his former girlfriend Cassie Ventura and then followed by a dozen additional lawsuits. Last month, he was indicted by federal prosecutors over allegations that he ran a sprawling criminal operation for years aimed at satisfying his need for “sexual gratification.” If convicted on the charges, which include sex trafficking and racketeering, he faces a potential sentence of life in prison.
Many of the previous lawsuits deal with allegations stretching back years, some dating to the early 1990s. Some of Sunday’s new cases include similar claims, including one from an Arizona woman who claims Combs drugged and raped her following a party at Las Vegas’ Planet Hollywood hotel.
But the new cases also include accusations that reach up until December 2022, less than a year before Combs began facing public abuse allegations. In that case, filed by the unnamed musical artist, the plaintiff claims she attended a New York City party hosted by Combs that month; after having a single glass of wine, she says she soon began “slipping in and out of consciousness.”
“Due to the effects of her drugged drink, Combs raped and sexually assaulted plaintiff,” her lawyers say. “Plaintiff could not stop him from doing so, as if she was trapped inside her body not participating but not able to resist.”
Three of the cases on Sunday were filed by men and three by women; five of them were filed in New York federal court, as were Buzbee’s previous lawsuits. But one was filed in Manhattan’s state court, where an unnamed security guard says that Combs drugged him at a 2005 party and “reached into plaintiff’s pants and grabbed plaintiff’s penis and genitals.”
Also on Sunday night, Combs’ lawyers filed a motion asking the judge overseeing the criminal case for a gag order that would bar alleged victims and their attorneys from issuing “extrajudicial statements” about Combs to the press. They argued such victims are potential witnesses in the upcoming criminal trial and that media statements “threaten Mr. Combs’s right to a fair trial.”
Demetrius “Big Meech” Flenory, the convicted drug trafficker and money-laundering kingpin who was involved in the early careers of rappers Jeezy and T.I. in the 2000s via his label BMF Entertainment, has been released from prison, Billboard has confirmed. Flenory, who was sentenced to 30 years in prison in 2008 after being convicted on several […]
T.I.‘s son Clifford “King” Harris Jr. was arrested earlier this week in Georgia. Fox 5 Atlanta is reporting that jail records indicate the rapper’s 20-year-old son had an open warrant for his arrest in Pickens County for failure to appear in court. The warrant stems from charges of speeding, driving with a suspended license, and […]
Members of 2 Live Crew have won a jury verdict allowing the hip hop legends to regain legal control of much of their catalog from a small record label that owned their copyrights for decades.
After years of litigation, a Florida federal jury said Wednesday that Uncle Luke (Luther Campbell) and the heirs of Fresh Kid Ice (Christopher Wong Won) and Brother Marquis (Mark Ross) were entitled to invoke copyright law’s “termination right” – a provision that allows creators to take back their works decades after they sold them away to a company.
Attorneys for Lil Joe Records, which bought the band’s catalog out of bankruptcy in the 1990s, argued that termination didn’t apply to 2 Live Crew’s albums. Lawyers for Campbell and his late bandmates argued back that the right to terminate was “inalienable” and couldn’t be forfeited.
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In Wednesday’s verdict, the jurors sided with 2 Live Crew, finding the band members had lawfully regained control of the five albums at issue in the case — including their provocative 1989 record As Nasty as They Wanna Be, which reached No. 29 on the Billboard 200 and was certified platinum.
In a statement to Billboard, 2 Live’s attorney Scott Alan Burroughs said he and his clients were “extremely pleased” with the outcome: “Our team has fought this battle for nearly four years and are thankful to have had the opportunity to present our case to the jury and see justice served. The verdict was a total and overwhelming victory for our clients and artists everywhere.”
Meanwhile, Richard Wolfe, lead counsel Lil Joe Records and label owner Joe Weinberger, vowed to appeal the verdict, saying it dealt with novel legal questions about the interplay between termination rights and federal bankruptcy law.
“Since this is a matter of first impression … which has never before been heard by any court, it may go to the Supreme Court,” Wolfe told Billboard. “The bankruptcy code is clear that all assets of a bankrupt party are part of the bankruptcy estate. All means all.”
The verdict was first reported by Law360 and confirmed by Billboard.
2 Live Crew, a pioneering hip hop group known for the backlash sparked by its sexually-explicit lyrics, is just the latest classic act to use the termination right, which typically kicks into action 35 years after a song was released.
Jay-Z has already invoked it to win back control of his debut album Reasonable Doubt, a fact revealed during a recent legal dispute over Damon Dash’s stake in Roc-A-Fella Records. Earlier this year, Cher won a legal battle with Sonny Bono’s widow over whether termination trumped a decades-old divorce settlement. And before that, groups of artists filed class actions against Universal Music Group and Sony Music Entertainment, seeking to win back control of their masters en masse.
2 Live’s dispute kicked off in November 2020, when Campbell and other members notified Lil Joe that they planned to invoke termination and take back control of their music. Lil Joe and Weinberger had purchased 2 Live Crew’s catalog when the group’s previous label, Luke Records Inc., went bankrupt in 1995. When the two sides could not come to terms, Lil Joe sued the members in federal court.
During the case, the label argued that the bankruptcy sale, which had been signed by a judge, made clear that the album rights were “free and clear of any and all liens” or other caveats. The company also argued the albums were created as “works for hire” – meaning Lil Joe had always been the legal owner of the copyrights, and there were no rights to 2 Live to take back in the first place.
But at the trial this month, 2 Live’s attorneys told a different story. As reported by Law360, Burroughs argued the group had “trusted” Weinberg but that he had “betrayed them and steered them into bankruptcy,” where he was able to purchase the rights to their music on the cheap. He called the story a “tale of deceit and dishonesty that wouldn’t be out of place in a Netflix movie.”
Lil Joe can appeal the outcome, first by asking the judge to overturn the verdict and then by taking the case to a federal appeals court. Such proceedings could take months or even years, depending on how higher courts rule.
Lawyers for Sean “Diddy” Combs are demanding that the government reveal the names of his alleged sexual abuse victims, arguing he cannot fairly defend himself without knowing their identities.
In a motion filed late Tuesday in Manhattan federal court, the star’s attorneys asked the judge to force prosecutors to filed a so-called bill of particulars, disclosing who exactly was accusing him of abuse.
Citing a “torrent” of anonymous civil accusations ranging from “false to outright absurd,” Combs’ lawyers say they cannot mount an adequate defense without knowing which of those claims forms the basis for the criminal charges.
“The government is forcing him, unfairly, to play a guessing a game—one made all the more challenging by the onslaught of baseless allegations that desperate plaintiffs are lodging at him (for the most part anonymously) in civil suits designed to exact a payoff from Mr. Combs and others,” Combs attorney Marc Agnifilo writes in the filing.
The defense attorneys say the wording of the sex trafficking and racketeering indictment is so vague that it “could be interpreted as treating Mr. Combs’ entire sexual history over the past sixteen years as part of the alleged criminal conspiracy.”
“Without clarity from the government, Mr. Combs has no way of knowing which allegations the government is relying on for purposes of the Indictment,” Agnifilo writes.
Combs, also known as Puff Daddy and P. Diddy, was once one of the most powerful men in the music industry. But last month, he was indicted by federal prosecutors on charges of racketeering and sex trafficking over what the government says was a sprawling criminal operation aimed at satisfying his need for “sexual gratification.”
The decades-long scheme allegedly involved not only elaborate sexual parties called “freak offs” and other sex abuse, but also forced labor, kidnapping, arson and bribery. If convicted on all of the charges at trial – currently set to start May 5 – Combs potentially faces a sentence of life in prison.
With the trial still months away, Combs’ attorneys have already begun to fight back. In a motion last week, they accused the government of leaking evidence to the press, including the infamous video of Combs assaulting then-girlfriend Cassie Ventura. Prosecutors have argued back that those “baseless” claims are a strategic move aimed at preventing prosecutors from showing the video to jurors.
In Tuesday’s filing, Combs’ lawyers argued that the continued anonymity of the alleged victims would seriously hamper their practical ability to prepare for the trial
“Mr. Combs … anticipates that the discovery will contain voluminous evidence of consensual sexual activity – making it all the more difficult for Mr. Combs to ascertain which of his prior sexual partners now claim, years later, that they felt coerced,” his lawyers write.
If history is any guide, Combs’ lawyers face an uphill battle in convincing the judge to unmask his alleged victims.
In the similar racketeering case against R. Kelly, prosecutors privately disclosed the names of several alleged victims to Kelly’s legal team, but argued that others must remain hidden, citing concerns that the singer or his entourage might seek to intimidate them.
The judge eventually agreed, saying that federal courts “routinely deny requests for victims’ identities in racketeering cases, especially when the government demonstrates a risk to witness safety [or] the potential for witness intimidation.” At Kelly’s eventual trial in 2021, several victims testified under pseudonyms.
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: Limp Bizkit sues Universal Music Group for $200 million over claims that the band has ‘never’ been paid royalties; a lawsuit against Nelly takes a twist as his former bandmates allegedly push back on the case; Barry White’s estate files a lawsuit over Future and Metro Boomin’s chart-topper “Like That”; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: Has Limp Bizkit Really Never Gotten Royalties?
At one point in the bombshell, $200 million lawsuit Limp Bizkit filed against Universal Music Group last week, the band’s attorneys explicitly asked the question that everyone was thinking as they read the case: “The band had still not been paid a single cent by UMG in any royalties until taking action against UMG, leading one to ask how on earth that could possibly be true.”
How on earth, indeed. How had one of the biggest bands of its era, which sold millions of records during the music industry’s MTV-fueled, turn-of-the-century glory days, still never have been paid any royalties nearly three decades later?
According to Limp Bizkit and frontman Fred Durst, the answer is an “appalling and unsettling” scheme by UMG centered on “systemic” and “fraudulent” policies that were “deliberately designed” to conceal royalties from artists and “keep those profits for itself.”
Scathing language aside, the lawsuit really appears to be a long-delayed dispute over recoupment.
Durst says that UMG repeatedly told him that Limp remained unrecouped — meaning its royalties still had not surpassed the amount the group had been paid in upfront advances. UMG allegedly told Durst that it had paid out a whopping $43 million in advances over the years, a huge figure that would go a long way to explaining the lack of royalties.
Limp Bizkit’s lawsuit says UMG didn’t provide “any back-up for this alleged amount” – and that the label essentially kept the band in the red with shady bookkeeping, including “intentionally concealing the true amount of sales” and “fraudulent accounting practices.”
“Where did this additional $199,676.00 charged to the account come from?” the band’s lawyers wrote at one point, referring to one such alleged inconsistency. “It seems to have come out of thin air to overdraft Limp Bizkit’s due and payable account in order to defraud Limp Bizkit and show an unrecouped account.”
UMG has not yet publicly commented on the allegations, so we’ll keep you updated when the music giant files its first formal response in court…
Other top stories this week…
ALWAYS MORE DIDDY – Since you last heard from Legal Beat one whole week ago, there have somehow already been four big developments in the story of Sean “Diddy” Combs, who stands accused of decades of sexual abuse. Here goes:
-Attorneys for the rapper filed their opening salvo in an appeal of a ruling denying him pre-trial release on bail, arguing the “sensationalism” of the case led the judge to keep him locked up over “purely speculative” concerns about witness intimidation. In the days since, the appeals court has already declined to issue a quick ruling releasing him; instead, the court will hear the case at normal pace and rule at some point in the next few months on whether he should be set free until trial.
-Less than a day after filing the appeal, Combs’s team accused the government of leaking evidence to the media in order to “taint the jury pool and deprive Mr. Combs of his right to a fair trial.” Among other evidence allegedly shared with the press? The infamous surveillance video of Combs assaulting then-girlfriend Cassie in 2016, which his lawyers say was leaked “to mortally wound the reputation and the prospect of Sean Combs successfully defending himself.”
-The judge set a May 5 date for the start of Combs’ criminal trial, in which he will face charges of racketeering and sex trafficking over what prosecutors say was a sprawling criminal operation aimed at satisfying his need for “sexual gratification.” The schedule could still be pushed back, particularly if prosecutors file new charges or add defendants to the case, or if Combs eventually gets released on bail and chooses to waive his “speedy trial” right.
-Six new civil lawsuits were filed in Manhattan federal court, including one from a man who says he was sexually assaulted by Combs in 1998 when he was 16 years old and attending one of the rapper’s famed “white parties” in the Hamptons. The cases were the first in a wave of dozens of civil cases that are expected to be filed in the weeks ahead by Los Angeles attorney Andrew Van Arsdale and Texas attorney Tony Buzbee, who earlier this month said they are representing at least 120 such alleged victims.
ST. LUNATICS REBEL – Weeks after Nelly’s former St. Lunatics groupmates sued him for allegedly cutting them out of royalties, an attorney for the star claimed that three of them had never approved the lawsuit in the first place. In a letter sent last month, Nelly’s attorney warned the lawyer who filed the case last month that Murphy Lee (Tohri Harper), Kyjuan (Robert Kyjuan) and City Spud (Lavell Webb) had recently retained his services and had “informed me that they did not authorize you to include them as plaintiffs” and were “demanding you remove their names” from the case.
DR. DRE’S DR. DRAMA – Dr. Dre was hit with a lawsuit accusing him a waging a “malicious campaign of harassment” against a psychiatrist served as a marriage counselor and mediator for the rapper and his now-ex-wife Nicole Young. Dr. Charles J. Sophy says the rapper subjected him to a “barrage of threats” via text message, and even sent fake FBI agents to his home to intimidate him. Dre’s attorneys quickly fired back, saying Sophy only sued because Dre is currently seeking to have his medical license revoked over allegations of “dereliction of duties and incredible incompetence” during the divorce.
SAMPLE SPAT – Barry White’s estate filed a copyright lawsuit over allegations that a prominent sample at the heart of Future and Metro Boomin’s chart-topping “Like That” infringes the rights to a 1973 song by the legendary singer — but they didn’t actually file the case against those stars. Instead, they sued duo Rodney-O (Rodney Oliver) & Joe Cooley, the classic hip hop duo behind “Everlasting Bass,” the track that Future and Metro Boomin sampled.
NAME BLAME – Attorneys for Garth Brooks publicly disclosed the name of a woman who sued the country star for sexual assault, naming her as a defendant in a lawsuit that accuses the woman of extortion and defamation. The move drew a sharp rebuke from the woman’s lawyers, who said Brooks had “publicly named a rape victim” in order to “punish” her for speaking out.
THE CASE ISN’T ALRIGHT – A California appeals court sided with The Offspring in a long-running court case filed by former drummer Ron Welty, rejecting his claims that he was owed millions more from the punk band’s $35 million catalog sale to Round Hill Music. A Los Angeles judge rejected those accusations last year, and California’s Court of Appeals ruled that there had been “no reversible error” in that decision.
I WANT MY ROYALTIES BACK, ROYALTIES BACK – What’s going on in the Chili’s legal department? For the second time this year, the huge restaurant chain was sued over accusations that it used copyrighted music on social media without permission — this time by Universal Music Group over dozens songs by Ariana Grande, Justin Bieber and other stars. The new case came shortly after the advertising-averse Beastie Boys sued Chili’s over the same thing back in July.
TAKING THE STAND – Amid a lawsuit claiming Martin Shkreli might leak copies of Wu-Tang Clan’s ultra-rare album Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, a federal judge ruled that the pharma exec must personally go to court and testify under oath about the fate of the album. Shkreli once owned the album, but was forced to forfeit to federal prosecutors after he was convicted of securities fraud.
YE LAWSUIT UPDATE – Ye (formerly Kanye West) was sued by Lauren Pisciotta, a former assistant who claimed that the rapper drugged and sexually assaulted her during a studio session he co-hosted with Diddy. Pisciotta already sued Ye in July for sexual harassment, breach of contract and wrongful termination, but she filed an updated version of the case that includes the Diddy-linked claims.