Legal
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The Atlanta judge overseeing Young Thug’s gang trial held the rapper’s attorney in criminal contempt of court Monday (June 10) in a bizarre episode centered on claims of a secret meeting between the judge, prosecutors and a key witness.
After attorney Brian Steel argued that the so-called ex parte meeting involved the improper coercion of a sworn witness, Judge Ural Glanville repeatedly demanded that Steel divulge who had informed him about a private meeting in his chambers. “If you don’t tell me how you got this information, you and I are going to have problems.”
Steel refused to do so, saying that it had been the meeting itself that was the problem. “You’re not supposed to have communication with a witness who’s been sworn,” he told the judge. During the meeting, Steel said he had been told, prosecutors and the judge had pressed the witness, Kenneth Copeland, to testify by saying he could be held in jail for an extended period of time if he did not.
“If that’s true, what this is is coercion, witness intimidation,” Steel told Glanville, arguing that defense counsel should have been notified of a meeting involving a sworn witness and that it was grounds for a mistrial.
After Steel continued to refuse to share where he received the information, Glanville held him in contempt and eventually ordered him taken into custody. As he was escorted out of the courtroom, into custody, Steel told the judge that Thug did not wish to proceed without his attorney present: “You’re taking away his right to counsel.”
The move to banish Steel led to confusion in the courtroom. Thug’s other attorney, Keith Adams, said he could not continue without his co-counsel, and even prosecutors asked that Steel be present for the remainder of the day if the trial was going to proceed with testimony. Judge Glanville eventually agreed, allowing Steel to re-enter, but said he had not softened his stance.
“You will go into custody at 5 o’clock today … if you don’t tell me who that is,” the judge said. “This is criminal contempt. I have asked you a question related to this particular proceeding and if you don’t tell me you’ll suffer the consequences.”
It’s unclear if the contempt will impact Steel’s ability to continue to represent Thug as the case moves forward. Steel did not immediately return a request for comment on Monday.
Thug (Jeffery Williams) and dozens of others were indicted in May 2022 over allegations that his “YSL” group was not really a record label called “Young Stoner Life” but a violent Atlanta gang called “Young Slime Life.” Prosecutors claim the group committed murders, carjackings, armed robberies, drug dealing and other crimes over the course of a decade.
Jury selection kicked off in January 2023, but the trial itself did not begin until November and has since been marked by numerous delays. With dozens of witnesses still set to testify in the prosecution case, the trial is expected to run into 2025.
Attorneys for Madonna and Live Nation say they’re facing a “harassment campaign” from the lawyers suing over delayed starts to the singer’s concerts, aimed at “extorting a lucrative settlement” rather than actually litigating the case.
The charged language came amid a class action accusing Madonna and Live Nation of breaking laws by making fans wait hours at December concerts in Brooklyn on her Celebration Tour — one of three such cases filed over the past six months that all make similar allegations.
Over the weekend, the dueling teams of lawyers engaged in a bizarre back and forth. On Friday (June 7), attorneys for the accusers told the judge that the two sides had “reached a settlement” that would end the case. But first thing on Monday morning (June 10), Madonna’s legal team emphatically denied that any such deal had been reached: “The parties have not settled this matter.”
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“To be clear, defendants are not necessarily opposed to settlement if certain terms can be reached,” wrote Jeff Warshafsky, a partner at the law firm Proskauer who reps Madonna and Live Nation. “But defendants will not be harassed into settlement and cannot abide false statements made to the court.”
In the filing, Madonna’s lawyer said the two sides had “discussed the possibility of settlement” but that they had “made no settlement offer” and “we do not know what plaintiffs believe they are accomplishing or trying to accomplish with the false notice.”
“The false notice is part and parcel of the harassment campaign that plaintiffs’ counsel has been waging against defendants over the last several months in hopes of extorting a lucrative settlement by forcing defendants to incur unnecessary legal fees,” Warshafsky wrote. “Whatever plaintiffs’ motive … defendants believe plaintiffs’ complaint is completely without merit and intend to fully defend themselves.”
An attorney for Madonna’s accusers did not immediately return a request for comment.
Madonna and Live Nation were first sued in January over the Brooklyn shows — a case that made headlines because it claimed the fans “had to get up early to go to work” the next day. She was later hit with a similar case in Washington, D.C. that claimed fans had waited in an “uncomfortably hot” arena and that she had lip-synched portions of the show. A third case, filed last month, echoed those claims but also alleged that Madonna’s show had been unexpectedly “pornographic.”
All three cases have been filed as class actions, seeking to represent potentially thousands of other fans who also faced the alleged delays. By starting the concerts later than expected, the cases claim Madonna and Live Nation breached their contracts with fans and violated state consumer protection laws.
Madonna’s attorneys have strongly rejected those accusations. In a request to dismiss the New York case earlier this year, her lawyers argued that simply needing to wake up early was not the kind of “cognizable injury” that can form the basis for a lawsuit. And they say that anyone buying a concert ticket is well aware that a show likely won’t start at the exact time printed on the ticket.
“No reasonable concertgoer — and certainly no Madonna fan — would expect the headline act at a major arena concert to take the stage at the ticketed event time,” her legal team wrote in April.
A version of that motion to dismiss the case remains pending. With no settlement reached, a response from Madonna’s accusers is due on July 1.
A California judge presiding over a sex trafficking case that was brought against Madison Square Garden Entertainment (MSGE) CEO/executive chairman James Dolan, the Azoff Companies and Harvey Weinstein in January is weighing several motions to throw out the lawsuit, with a decision expected to be announced as soon as early next week.
Attorney Douglas Windor, a high-profile litigator who represented Casandra Ventura (a.k.a. singer Cassie) in her since-settled sex trafficking lawsuit against Sean “Diddy” Combs, filed an explosive lawsuit in January on behalf of Tennessee massage therapist Kellye Croft, who alleged that Dolan and an employee of Azoff Music Management conspired to traffic her to California to have sex with Dolan — who in turn allegedly trafficked her to Weinstein.
Representing Azoff Companies is powerful New York litigator Daniel Petrocelli, partner at O’Melveny & Myers LLP, who has represented Donald Trump and Travis Scott. Dolan is represented by Danya Perry, a former assistant U.S. attorney and ex-chief of litigation at MacAndrews & Forbes.
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Petrocelli and Perry have each filed separate motions to dismiss the case, which is being handled by Judge Percy Anderson, while Perry has issued a blanket denial of Croft’s claims against Dolan.
Croft alleges that she was hired to work with the late Glenn Frey in October 2013 while the vocalist and Eagles frontman was touring with the band and opening act JD and the Straight Shot, which is led by Dolan. Croft alleges that Dolan befriended her during the tour, gained her trust and then sexually assaulted her before coercing her into a sexual relationship while on the road.
Two months after returning home to Nashville in the wake of the tour, Croft alleges she was contacted by an executive at Azoff Music Management and hired to work as Frey’s masseuse for the Eagles’ six-night run of concerts at Kia Forum in Los Angeles. When Croft arrived in Los Angeles, she learned that he was staying at a different hotel than the band — leading her to suspect that she was really hired by Azoff Management as a favor to Dolan.
“Ms. Croft did not perform a single massage on any member of the Eagles while working at The Forum,” Wingdor writes, alleging that “in reality, Ms. Croft was flown out to Los Angeles for the purposes of engaging in unwanted sexual acts with Dolan.”
Croft also claims that she was set up by Dolan, allegedly with the help of two Azoff employees, for an encounter with Weinstein, the disgraced film producer and convicted rapist, during her stay at the Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills. Croft says she was confronted by Weinstein in an elevator and allegedly offered a job on the set of an upcoming film — only to later be sexually propositioned by the film producer, who then followed her to her room and sexually assaulted her, according to the complaint.
Dolan’s relationship with Weinstein dates back to 2003 when Dolan and Weinstein were part of an investment group — which also included financier and convicted sexual predator Jeffrey Epstein — that was hoping to purchase New York magazine. Dolan also briefly served on the board of The Weinstein Company starting in 2016.
Croft allegedly decided to file the lawsuit after Dolan sent her the lyrics to “I Should’ve Known,” a song he wrote lamenting his failure to stop Weinstein from victimizing women.
In April, Perry filed a motion to dismiss Croft’s lawsuit, arguing that even if the woman’s claims were true, she still can’t sue Dolan under the Trafficking Victims Protect Act because “the bill targets and criminalizes sex trafficking, not sexual relations (which is all that is alleged in (Croft’s complaint),” according to the motion. Wigdor responded in a separate filing that Perry’s reading of the law was “wrong.”
As to the Weinstein allegation, Perry is arguing that Dolan and other former Weinstein Company board members were already released from any claims “to alleged sexual misconduct by Weinstein” during 2018 bankruptcy proceedings. Wigdor countered that Croft “did not consent to waive her claims” and wasn’t aware of the bankruptcy.
Petrocelli’s motion to dismiss argues that Croft’s complaint “contains no facts suggesting the Azoff Entities participated in, benefitted from, or even knew about any sex trafficking scheme” when hiring her. Petrocelli also wants Croft and her attorney sanctioned for filing the lawsuit and is asking that Croft be required to pay Azoff’s legal costs.
The motions have been taken under advisement by the judge, who late last week canceled a Monday (June 3) hearing for oral arguments on the motions, noting the “Court finds this matter appropriate for decision without oral argument.“ His ruling is expected any day.
Major League Baseball’s players’ union is firing back at claims that it discriminated against Bad Bunny’s sports agency, saying the company was penalized due to “egregious and systemic” rules violations, including offering prospective clients free VIP tickets to Bad Bunny concerts.
Rimas Sports sued the MLB Players Association (MLBPA) last month, claiming the union had used a “pre-determined investigation” to ban the Puerto Rican agency to protect existing agents from competition. The lawsuit is seeking an injunction that would overturn the league’s penalties and allow Rimas to continue to represent players.
But in a response filing this week, attorneys for the union said Rimas had incurred the punishment through its own “unethical conduct” that had broken MLBPA rules — namely, offering splashy and valuable gifts to prospective clients to win them over.
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“The regulations strictly forbid such inducements,” the union’s lawyers wrote in a motion on Wednesday (June 5). “Player agents must compete for clients based on the quality of their representation, not the quality of their gifts.”
The MLBPA’s investigation into Rimas had unearthed “egregious and systemic violations” of those rules, the union’s attorneys said, quoting from an arbitrator’s ruling that said Rimas’ core strategy had been “building a baseball agency by luring players with forbidden gifts.”
“Immunizing Rimas from the consequences of its own bad conduct will harm players and other player agents by encouraging player-player agent relationships borne out of perquisites not performance,” the union’s lawyers wrote. “What Rimas seeks is a get out of jail free card for itself. The public has no interest in such an outcome.”
Launched in 2021 by Bad Bunny (Benito Martínez Ocasio) and his longtime manager, Noah Assad, Rimas Sports aimed to provide homegrown representation to Major League Baseball’s many players from Latin America.
But in April, the MLBPA handed down a raft of penalties against the agency, including decertifying one agent, barring Assad from seeking certification and prohibiting existing certified agents from joining the company. When Rimas challenged the penalties, an arbitrator rejected the appeal and upheld the union’s actions.
Last month, attorneys for Rimas escalated the dispute by filing a lawsuit in federal court that accused the MLBPA of imposing a “death penalty” on the new agency. They claimed the penalties had come from a “discriminatory” investigation that had been launched because Rimas had threatened established agencies with competition.
“The ‘good ole boy’ order of baseball sports agency … was being put at risk, as these Puerto Rican ‘outsiders’ were disrupting baseball sports agency order too much, too fast,” attorneys for Rimas wrote. “This was something that the MLBPA and Rimas Sports’ competitors would not allow.”
Calling the penalties “extraordinary and unprecedented,” Rimas sought a preliminary injunction putting them on hold while the case plays out. The agency claimed the penalties had caused immediate harm, including preventing the agency from completing its agreement to sign reigning National League MVP Ronald Acuña Jr. as a client.
In its initial filing of the lawsuit, Rimas did not specifically indicate what exactly MLBPA accused the group of doing wrong. But in Wednesday’s opposition, the union laid out the accusations in great detail.
According to the filing, certain prospective clients were offered free concert tickets, including VIP concert tickets to Bad Bunny concerts and suite access to a Phoenix Suns game. Another player was allegedly offered a $200,000 interest-free loan. “This kind of conduct became culture at Rimas,” the MLBPA wrote.
The agency was “so dismissive” of the rules around illegal gifts that it continued to violate them even after they were notified that they were under investigation, the union’s attorney wrote Wednesday.
In technical terms, the MLBPA has filed both an opposition to deny Rimas an injunction, as well as a motion to compel arbitration — meaning a judge will order that the dispute must be handled via private arbitrator, not in federal court. A hearing is set for later this month for the judge to weigh the key issue in the case.
Bun B and his wife, Queenie (real name Angela Walls), were the victims of a 2019 armed home invasion. Five years after Demonte Jackson’s arrest, the then 20-year-old intruder has learned his fate: 40 years behind bars, according to Houston’s Fox 26 and CBS affiliate KHOU 11. The decision came Friday (June 7), one day after the musician’s testimony.
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The UGK rap legend — born Bernard Freeman — took the stand at Jackson’s sentencing hearing on Thursday (June 6), where he delivered a poignant testimony recounting the home invasion and detailed the emotional toll its taken on his family.
“There are times when [Queenie] gets closed off,” he said in court footage shared by Houston’s Fox 26. “She can’t communicate, and I just get so angry all over again because she didn’t deserve this. She didn’t ask for this.”
“Just the idea of seeing my wife in this state, hearing her voice in this state,” the artist said in court, per video shared by ABC news affiliate KTRK in Houston. “I mean I’m her husband, that’s my primary job, is protecting her, making her feel safe.”
The couple’s ordeal began in April 2019 when Queenie answered their Houston home’s front door expecting an Amazon delivery, but instead was faced with a masked armed robber. Jackson held a terrified Queenie at gunpoint and demanded valuables while she led him to the garage.
“I wanted to confront the person who put that fear in my wife’s voice,” Bun told the courtroom. “She was very panicked. She was borderline hysterical. She just did not want me to go out that door and face the person with the gun.”
Still, Bun B grabbed his firearm and headed to the garage where he found Jackson behind the wheel of his Audi, and the two exchanged gunfire.
The Trill OG rapper wounded Jackson — now 25 years old — with a shot in the shoulder. After a brief tussle, Jackson attempted to flee the scene on foot, but Bun caught and unmasked him so he could be identified, but the intruder eventually got away. After being treated at a local hospital for his injuries, police apprehended Jackson and he pleaded guilty in December 2019 to two counts of aggravated robbery and one count of burglary.
“I wanted to know who that was behind the mask,” the H-Town rapper explained in court. “I wanted to know if this was someone I knew personally or someone that knew someone I knew personally.”
Bun B also shared that the traumatizing incident still affects Queenie to this day. “She was broken. She was absolutely broken,” he added, according to ABC13. “My wife never stepped foot in that house again.”
Watch clips of Bun B’s testimony below.
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A clip of a witness’ testimony has been making the rounds on X. While being examined Thursday (June 6) by Atlanta state prosecutors during the YSL RICO trial, former Hertz rental car employee Ira Singleton was asked about a 2014 Infiniti Q50 Young Thug (real name Jeffrey Williams) allegedly used in the murder of “rival gang member” […]
When the U.S. Supreme Court’s nine justices released their annual financial disclosures on Friday (June 7), Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson reported a cooler-than-usual line item: that Beyoncé had personally gifted her four concert tickets.
In a yearly report required by federal ethics laws, Justice Jackson listed her various investments, as well as a nearly $1 million book advance she received from Penguin Random House for her Lovely One memoir set to hit bookshelves this fall.
But the most notable item was under gifts, where the justice listed “Concert Tickets (4),” valued at $3,711. The source of those tickets? “Beyonce Knowles-Carter.”
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The filing, obtained by Billboard, did not include any more information, like what particular shows Justice Jackson had attended or how KBJ and Queen Bey had connected. A spokesperson for Beyoncé did not immediately return a request for comment.
This year’s SCOTUS disclosures have drawn far greater attention than usual, following revelations last year that Justice Clarence Thomas had received undisclosed expensive gifts, including trips aboard a private plane, from Republican megadonor Harlan Crow. In his own report on Friday, Justice Thomas formally amended the disputed trips to his earlier filings but did not list any new travel reimbursements for 2023.
Members of the federal judiciary are not barred from owning investments, earning outside income or even accepting gifts like expensive concert tickets. But they must disclose such income to avoid any potential conflicts of interest involving cases that they’re tasked with deciding.
When faced with a financial conflict of interest — or even the appearance of such bias — lower federal judges are required to recuse themselves from cases. In a new code of conduct issued last year after the Thomas-Crow uproar, the high court agreed to follow essentially those same rules. But those new regulations noted that recusals are harder at the Supreme Court, where a justice cannot simply be replaced by another judge.
In the case of Justice Jackson, such questions would only arise if Beyoncé had business before the high court — an outcome that’s not impossible, given the rash of copyright litigation in the music industry, but seems unlikely any time soon.
Phish fans beware: Smoke a bong in the Las Vegas Sphere at your own risk.
A Phish fan who bragged in April about taking the “first bong hit to ever be ripped” in the Sphere — and posted a viral video of him doing so — now says he’s received a letter from Madison Square Garden Entertainment’s lawyers banning him from the venue and all other MSG facilities.
In an image of the purported letter posted to an Instagram account called @acid_farts, an attorney for MSG told the unnamed owner of the account that the company “will not tolerate actions that threaten the safety and security of our guests.”
“You knowingly violated the guest code of conduct by visibly smoking inside the venue,” wrote Christopher Schimpf, an associate general counsel at MSG, in the letter dated June 3. “In light of your conduct, you are hereby indefinitely banned from Madison Square Garden, Radio City Music Hall … and any other MSG venue.”
The purported letter, reposted by the well-known Phish fan account called @phunkyourface, told the alleged bong-ripper that he was “not to enter into or remain in any of the MSG venues at any time in the future.” If he does so, “law enforcement will be contacted to ensure your expulsion and you will be subject to the penalties.”
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A spokeswoman for MSG did not immediately return a request for comment on the situation.
Coming from MSG, a threat to ban someone is not just bluster. The company has made headlines over the past two years over its use of facial recognition technology to ban certain people from the famed Manhattan arena, including plaintiffs’ lawyers who filed lawsuits against the company. And owner James Dolan has previously issued high-profile bans against Charles Oakley, a former New York Knicks star, as well as against a Knicks fan who yelled at him in 2017 to sell the team.
The use of such technology for safety and security purposes has become widespread and is largely considered legal, and lawsuits from the attorneys who were banned from MSG were mostly unsuccessful. But it has drawn criticism from some civil liberties experts and lawmakers, who fear that it poses privacy risks and could be used punitively.
The Sphere, a $2.3 billion immersive concert venue with LED screens stretching 250 feet above and around the audience, opened in Las Vegas last fall. After a 40-show residency by U2, Phish became the second band to play the state-of-the-art arena with a four-concert run in April, featuring the unique sets and trippy visuals that the Vermont jam band’s rabid fan base has come to expect.
On April 20, the @acid_farts Instagram account posted a clip that purported to show him at one of those shows, taking a hit from a large glass water bong to applause from nearby fans. His caption: “First bong hit to ever be ripped in the @spherevegas @phish Somebody call @guinessworldrecords.” The video itself racked up 447 likes; when @phunkyourface reposted it a day later, it got another 4,773 thumbs up from the Phish faithful.
But apparently MSG wasn’t so amused. In his June 3 letter, Schimpf noted that “you posted an Instagram video of yourself smoking inside the Sphere,” before recounting the exact caption used on the post. He warned that the man was now banned not only from the company’s venues, but also from “the box office, Chase Square and the concierge areas” at the Manhattan arena.
Nobody wants to be banned from MSG’s venues — the company also owns New York’s Beacon Theatre and Chicago’s Chicago Theater — but such a ruling is particularly problematic for a Phish fan. Back in 2017, the band played a famous 13-night concert residency at MSG dubbed “The Baker’s Dozen,” and its New Year’s Eve concerts at the Midtown arena are an annual tradition for Phish fans. In recent years, Phish frontman Trey Anastasio has also performed at Radio City and The Beacon.
Following the news of the ban letter, Phish fans took to social media to joke about efforts to enforce a smoking ban at Phish shows, which are well-known for a liberal attitude toward drug use. In one post on X, user @MinnieFluff shared an image of Anastasio doing a soundcheck before an empty MSG: “Remaining crowd at Phish NYE 2026 after MSG Entertainment uses facial recognition to ban anyone that has ever smoked inside their venues.”
For his part, the owner of the @acid_farts account seems unfazed by MSG’s threats. In a note below the image of the letter, he said simply: “The Sphere sent me a plaque to commemorate what is now officially the first bong hit ever taken in The Sphere.”
Neither the owner of @acid_farts nor of @PhunkYourFace immediately returned direct messages from Billboard seeking comment.
Travis Scott is asking a federal judge to end a lawsuit accusing him of using unlicensed samples on songs from Utopia and Astroworld, arguing that nobody can claim a copyright on the words “alright, alright, alright.”
The case was filed in February by Dion Norman and Derrick Ordogne, who claim that Scott and Sony Music illegally borrowed a portion of their song “Bitches Reply” — an oft-sampled 1992 track that’s previously been used by Lil Wayne, Cardi B, Kid Cudi and others.
But in a motion to dismiss the case filed Monday (June 3), lawyers for Scott and Sony argue that the allegations were centered on the “untenable” claim to ownership over basic words — “alright, alright, alright” — that everyone should be free to use.
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“The only alleged copyright infringement here is the alleged copying of the word ‘alright’,” the star’s attorneys write. “But the single word ‘alright’ and the short phrase ‘alright, alright, alright’ lack even the minimal creativity required for copyright protection both because these lyrics are too short and because they are commonplace, or stock, expressions.”
Released in 1992 by DJ Jimi, “Bitches Reply” has reportedly been sampled or interpolated in dozens of songs, including tracks by Megan Thee Stallion, Drake and OutKast. Most of those samples have come from a staccato burst of the word “alright” shouted nine times at the beginning of the song.
Norman and Ordogne, who say they co-wrote DJ Jimi’s song and own the copyrights to it, claimed in their February lawsuit that Scott sampled from that portion of the track twice — first in his 2018 song “Stargazing” off the Astroworld album, and again in his 2023 “Til Further Notice” off Utopia.
But copyright law only protects “original” works, and that typically doesn’t include short phrases that are already widely used. In Monday’s response filing, Scott’s lawyers say that a repetition of a common word like “alright” in song lyrics was exactly that — too “trite” and “cliched” to meet copyright law’s basic requirements.
They cite numerous other songs that had featured the phrase before “Bitches Reply” was even released, including “Revolution” by The Beatles, Elton John’s “Saturday Night’s Alright” and Earth, Wind & Fire’s “Let’s Groove.” They also cite a 2003 ruling in which a federal judge ruled that T-Pain’s “Put It Down” didn’t infringe copyrights by using phrases like “I can’t get enough” and “raise your hands in the air.”
“The Copyright Act does not protect ‘stock’ expressions,” Scott’s lawyers write. “Because the allegedly infringed phrase “Alright, Alright, Alright” is too commonplace to be copyrightable, Plaintiffs’ copyright infringement claims should be dismissed.”
Monday’s motion also made various other attacks on Norman and Ordogne’s lawsuit, including that they failed to show that they own the proper copyright registrations and filed the claims over “Stargazing” past the statute of limitations.
An attorney for Norman and Ordogne did not immediately return a request for comment. Their lawyers can file a formal response to Scott’s motion in the coming weeks.
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: Cher wins a closely-watched termination battle against Sonny Bono’s widow; the massive copyright lawsuit against Bad Bunny and other reggaeton stars moves forward; R&B hitmaker The-Dream is hit with a sexual abuse lawsuit; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: Copyrights & Divorces & Cher, Oh My!
Cher emerged victorious last week in a long-running legal battle with Sonny Bono’s widow that centered on the messy intersection between federal copyrights and state-level divorce law.The lawsuit was the industry’s latest test of copyright law’s “termination right,” which gives creators and heirs the power to reclaim control of works decades after they sold them away. Created by Congress in the 1970s, termination was designed to level the playing field for creators who faced an “unequal bargaining position” with big companies and sold their rights for cheap.Over the past few years, record labels have faced class actions from artists seeking to win back their masters; musicians have pushed for a rule change to make sure songwriters can actually start collecting streaming royalties after they take back their copyrights; and individual artists like Dwight Yoakam, 2 Live Crew and KC & the Sunshine Band have all fought their own lawsuits over termination.Cher’s case posed new and difficult questions. After using termination to take back control of Sonny’s copyrights, Mary Bono argued that she was no longer required to honor Sonny and Cher’s 1978 divorce settlement, which gave the superstar a permanent 50% cut of the publishing revenue from songs written before the couple split up.But in a ruling on Wednesday (May 29), Judge John A. Kronstadt sided with Cher, ruling that she must continue to receive publishing royalties for her catalog of songs created with Sonny, including “I Got You Babe,” “The Beat Goes On” and “Baby Don’t Go.”For more, go read our entire breakdown of the ruling, including access to the judge’s full written decision.
Other top stories this week…
REGGAETON CASE GOES ON – A federal judge ruled that a sprawling copyright lawsuit can move forward with accusations that nearly 2,000 reggaeton songs — including hits by Bad Bunny, Karol G and dozens of others — all infringed a single 1989 song called “Fish Market” that allegedly spawned the so-called “dem bow” rhythm. The stars had argued that the lawsuit aimed to “monopolize practically the entire reggaetón musical genre,” but a judge said it was too early to make that argument — and that he wasn’t particularly receptive to it anyhow.“A PROLONGED NIGHTMARE” – The-Dream, a singer and producer who has worked with Beyoncé, Rihanna and others, was hit with a sex trafficking lawsuit that claims he subjected a young songwriter named Chanaaz Mangroe to an “abusive, violent, and manipulative relationship” that included an alleged incident of rape. The lawsuit claims the producer (Terius Gesteelde-Diamant) used promises of career advancement to lure a “young and vulnerable artist” into “a prolonged nightmare” filled with “violent sexual acts.”MEGAN THEE STALLION HITS BACK – The superstar rapper fired back at a lawsuit that claims she forced a cameraman named Emilio Garcia to watch her have sex with a woman inside a moving vehicle, filing a scathing first response that called those claims “false and fabricated” and labeled her accuser a “con artist.”MADONNA SUED AGAIN – The Queen of Pop was hit with yet another class action over delayed concerts on her Celebration Tour, this time from a ticket buyer who also claims that the show — which allegedly featured “topless women” who were “engaging in simulated sexual acts” — amounted to a form of “pornography.”STUBHUB JURY VERDICT – StubHub must pay more than $16 million in legal damages after a jury decided that the ticketing giant screwed over a smaller company called Spotlight Ticket Management — first by failing to pay millions in commissions, then by torpedoing the startup’s lucrative concierge partnership with American Express.KANYE HARASSMENT SUIT – Kanye West was sued by a former assistant named Lauren Pisciotta over allegations of sexual harassment and wrongful termination. In a lawsuit that came with pages of graphic texts that the rapper allegedly sent to her, Pisciotta’s attorneys claim she faced a “systematic” onslaught of “unlawful harassment” during her year of working for Ye.SPOTIFY SUED OVER “CAR THING” – A group of angry consumers filed a class action against Spotify over its recent decision to kill its short-lived “Car Thing” device, claiming that the streaming company’s move left them “with nothing more than a paperweight that cost between $50 and $100”.AEG CEO TALKS LIVE NATION CASE – In the wake of the DOJ’s antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation, AEG chairman/CEO Jay Marciano celebrated the case against its chief rival, saying it will bring “sweeping changes” to the live music industry. In an internal memo, Marciano said he believes that Live Nation “uses its monopoly power to impose its will on the live entertainment business.”
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