Legal
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The 1975 and frontman Matty Healy are facing a lawsuit from the organizers of Malaysia’s Good Vibes Festival, according to a report by Variety, filed over accusations that Healy’s on-stage protest of the country’s anti-LGBTQ laws resulted in the festival being shut down.
In a case filed in the UK’s High Court, Future Sound Asia is demanding $2.4 million over the July 2023 incident in Kuala Lumpur, during which Healy gave a profanity-laden speech criticizing Malaysia’s anti-LGBTQ laws and then kissed bandmate Ross MacDonald.
Following the incident, local authorities revoked the festival’s license and canceled the final two nights of shows. As reported by Billboard last year, sources within Future Sound said that the incident left the festival in financial ruin and could limit future concerts in Malaysia for years.
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In its lawsuit, Future Sound claims that Healy and The 1975 breached their contract with the festival, which stipulated that they would abide by local guidelines. Those rules included kissing, swearing, smoking and drinking on stage, taking off clothes, and talking about politics or religion.
The case claims that local authorities initially refused to let The 1975 play at all, citing Healy’s drug problems. But Future Sound claims that the band appealed and promised that Healy would adhere to “all local guidelines and regulations” in order to secure approval.
A rep for the band did not immediately return a request for comment on the accusations.
Healy’s kiss and statements — he said, among other things, that it was “f—ing ridiculous to tell people what they can do with that and that” — were meant as a protest against Malaysia’s strict anti-LGBTQ+ laws, which make homosexuality a crime.
But local activists have since criticized him, calling it a “publicity stunt” by a Western rock star with a “white savior complex.” He also took light criticism from Julian Casablancas of The Strokes, who had been scheduled to play before the festival was canceled, who said that people “should be knowledgable and respectful toward the culture you’re not familiar with.”
Healy addressed those critiques in October, saying he was “pissed off” about the “liberal outrage against our band for remaining consistent with our pro-LGBTQ stage show.”
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: Martin Shkreli argues he wasn’t required to turn over personal copies of a rare of Wu-Tang Clan album to prosecutors; a litigious rock photographer sues Warner Records in the latest of more than 50 copyright lawsuits; the new judge in Young Thug’s gang trial faces a flood of new motions; and more.
THE BIG STORY: The Plot Thickens In Wu-Tang Album Case
When Martin Shkreli was convicted of securities fraud and ordered to forfeit his copy of Wu-Tang Clan’s Once Upon a Time in Shaolin to federal prosecutors, was he allowed to retain personal copies? PleasrDAO — a digital art collective that bought the one-of-a-kind album from the government in 2021 —certainly thinks he wasn’t. The group sued Shkreli in federal court last month, accusing him of violating that forfeiture order by retaining copies and then threatening to leak them to the public, a move it says would destroy the value of the rare album. But in a new response last week, Shkreli’s attorneys told a very different story. Everyone knows that when the disgraced “Pharma Bro” bought the only copy of Wu-Tang’s album in 2014, the deal came with bizarre contractual requirements — namely, that he couldn’t release it to the general public until 2103. But Shkreli’s lawyers say the deal did allow him to make personal copies for private use. And when he turned over the physical CD to the government, his lawyers say he wasn’t required to hand over those private copies: “Defendant continues to have the right to use them to this day.” A month into the lawsuit, two dueling visions are coming into view. Pleasr is leaning on the forfeiture order, citing a passage that banned Shkreli from taking any action that would “affect the availability, marketability or value” of the album. Defense lawyers, on the other hand, point to the government’s sale to Pleasr, arguing that the feds made no assurances that the original CD was the only copy of Shaolin in existence. “Plaintiff was well aware that its purchase of assets from did not include any promise or expectation of ‘exclusivity’ or ‘uniqueness,’” Shkreli’s lawyers wrote. “It bought a copy of a musical work that it knew was not unique, and cannot now claim to be irreparably harmed by the existence of its non-uniqueness.” For more, go read our full story on the Shaolin case — and stay tuned for a looming ruling from the judge on whether to impose a preliminary injunction against Shkreli.
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Other top stories this week…
LEGAL EXPOSURE? – Neil Zlozower, a veteran rock photographer who’s snapped images of Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones and many other bands, filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Warner Records, accusing the label of using his photo of Tom Petty in a Facebook post without permission. It turns out the case is hardly the first for Zlozower, who has filed a whopping 57 copyright lawsuits since 2016, targeting Universal Music Group, Spotify, Ticketmaster, Mötley Crüe and many others over alleged unauthorized use of his images.CONCERT MELEE – Chris Brown and Live Nation were sued again over an alleged melee that took place backstage at a concert in Fort Worth last week, this time by a security guard who says he was “brutally and severely” beaten when he tried to break up the fight. The lawsuit, which cites Brown’s high-profile 2009 attack on his then-girlfriend Rihanna that led to a felony conviction, comes after the alleged victims themselves filed their own separate case.YSL CASE UPDATE – The new judge in Young Thug’s sprawling Atlanta gang trial, Judge Paige Reese Whitaker, has been greeted by a flood of new motions, including a renewed demand to release the rapper from the “torturous conditions” he’s faced while sitting in jail for more than two years. Judge Ural Glanville, who was removed from the case earlier this month after revelations of a secret meeting with prosecutors and a key witness, had repeatedly denied such requests. SHOOTING ARRESTS – Three men were arrested in Jacksonville in connection with the deadly shooting of rapper Julio Foolio last month. Sean Gathright, 18, Alicia Andrews, 21, and Isaiah Chance Jr., 21, were each charged with premeditated first degree murder with a firearm, among other charges, over the June 23 killing.
Live Nation’s top two in-house attorneys will not be allowed to access “highly confidential” documents produced by competitors like AEG Presents and SeatGeek in the antitrust lawsuit filed against the touring giant by the Department of Justice, though it will be granted access to less sensitive “confidential” documents under strict conditions limiting how the information is used and shared, according to a protective court order signed Monday (July 29) in the Southern District of New York.
A federal judge overseeing the case agreed to establish the two-tiered system for dealing with non-public documents the DOJ subpoenaed from Live Nation competitors as part of its ongoing investigation. For the last six weeks, DOJ antitrust lead trial counsel Bonny Sweeney has been in talks with Live Nation, which is accused of operating its ticketing and concert promotion businesses as a monopoly, about restricting access for the company’s in-house lawyers — executive vp of corporate and regulatory affairs Dan Wall and senior vp of litigation Kimberly Tobias — to confidential information handed over by competitors. Attorneys for Live Nation have argued that granting Wall and Tobias access to confidential information is vital in helping the company prepare its defense.
“Mr. Wall and Ms. Tobias are litigation counsel in good standing and officers of the court,” Live Nation outside counsel Alfred C. Pfeiffer wrote in a letter to New York federal judge Arun Subramanian. “Both have been bound by numerous protective orders and never been accused of violating those orders. Their access to confidential information in no way puts such information at risk.”
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Government lawyers counter that even if Wall and Tobias “pledge not to use any information they receive other than for this case, they can’t unsee what they have seen,” Subramanian wrote in a July 23 court order trying to resolve the confidentiality access question. Two days after that, attorneys for SeatGeek, AEG and ASM Global filed letters asking Subramanian to prevent Wall and Tobias from viewing any sensitive documents produced by the companies.
The files SeatGeek produced for the government “include documents that a company would never want to fall into the hands of any competitor,” SeatGeek attorney William Kalema wrote to the court.
“SeatGeek hears on at least a weekly basis from venues that are reluctant even to meet with SeatGeek for fear of retaliation from Defendants,” the letter continued. “If the market were to learn that venues’ contracts and other communications with Ticketmaster’s competitors were made available to Defendants’ senior management, SeatGeek’s ability to market its product would be hindered even further.”
Attorneys for AEG said they had produced “hundreds of thousands of documents” for the DOJ, including the company’s “most sensitive and competitively significant materials.” AEG attorney Justin Bernick took particular issue with Wall over past statements Wall has made in the media and on Live Nation’s blog, arguing that Wall has often acted as the company’s spokesperson rather than its lawyer.
After a brief hearing, Subramanian ruled that Wall and Tobias would not be allowed to view documents marked as highly confidential — meaning those involving trade secrets, customer lists, current or future financial and strategic information, private contract terms, personnel files, planning documents, and anything deemed sensitive by the courts — and that those documents can only be viewed by Live Nation’s outside attorneys. Wall and Tobias can, however, view confidential information — defined as previously non-public financial information, material related to ownership of non-public companies, business plans and marketing campaign documents related to product development.
In order to view confidential court files, Wall and Tobias must agree not to participate or advise Live Nation on “competitive decision-making” or litigation against AEG or SeatGeek — except for litigation tied to the DOJ lawsuit — for two years after the final confidential documents are reviewed.
The “highly confidential” and “confidential” designations will be determined by those producing the documents, Subramanian wrote in the earlier July 23 opinion, noting that “if it turns out that vast swaths of the record are improperly designated highly confidential, the Court will step in” and require “a page-by-page review of documents by the producing party on a tight timeframe or appropriate modifications to the protective order.”
Billboard has reached out to Live Nation for comment on this story. The trial for USA v. Live Nation Entertainment is scheduled to begin March 2, 2026.
The Tampa Police Department announced the arrest of three people on Monday (July 29) in connection with deadly shooting of rapper Julio Foolio last month. According to WFLA, three individuals — Sean Gathright, 18, Alicia Andrews, 21, and Isaiah Chance Jr., 21 — were arrested in Jacksonville and charged with premeditated first degree murder and […]
Neil Zlozower, a veteran rock photographer who’s snapped images of Led Zeppelin, The Rolling Stones, Michael Jackson and Bruce Springsteen, is suing Warner Records over a Facebook post featuring a picture of Tom Petty — the latest of more than 50 lawsuits the litigious photog has filed over the past decade.
In a case filed in Los Angeles federal court, Zlozower accuses Warner of infringing the copyright to his photo, which depicts ’70s-era Petty sitting in front of a record player. His lawyers claim the image was posted in 2020 to the official Facebook page for Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers, which Warner allegedly controls.
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“Defendant has not implemented adequate internal policies to verify copyright ownership before content use, indicating a gross negligence in legal compliance, which is essential for a company with defendant’s reach, capabilities, and level of sophistication,” Zlozower’s lawyer Craig Sanders writes in the July 23 complaint.
Warner’s alleged failure to employ such copyright protections indicates “de facto willful infringement” by the company, the lawsuit claims — a key accusation, since under U.S. copyright law “willful” violations can result in increased damages of up to $150,000 per work.
A spokesman for Warner did not return a request for comment on the lawsuit’s allegations.
The case is hardly the first for Zlozower, who has also photographed Prince, Van Halen and countless other bands and artists over a decades-long career. Since 2016, court records show he’s filed a whopping 57 copyright lawsuits against a wide range of defendants in federal courts around the country, demanding monetary damages over the alleged unauthorized use of his photographs.
Many of his cases have targeted media companies, including CBS, Buzzfeed and Vice. But he’s also twice sued Universal Music Group, once over an image of Elvis Costello and another time over a photo of Guns N’ Roses. A different case targeted Ticketmaster, accusing the Live Nation unit of using an image of Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Zakk Wylde. In 2019, Zlozower sued the guitar maker Gibson over claims that the company used a shot of Eddie Van Halen without permission.
Copyright lawsuits over the unauthorized use of photographs on the internet are extremely common, with hundreds filed in the federal courts each year. The photographers and attorneys who bring them say it’s their only real recourse against rampant online theft of their intellectual property, often by sophisticated companies that should know better.
“Photographers who are serious about protecting their copyright have no other choice but to file suit in [court] when an infringer refuses to negotiate,” says David C. Deal, an attorney who represents photographers in such cases. “Photographers are the overwhelming losers in the digital age because they are properly compensated at a fraction of the rate at which their intellectual property is copied and used by others.”
But critics have questioned the tactics of some particularly litigious photographers and their attorneys, suggesting they’re using litigation itself as a business model — namely, by leveraging the threat of huge damages and prohibitive costs of to win as many small “nuisance” settlements as possible.
In 2019, a federal judge sharply criticized David Oppenheimer, a North Carolina photographer who filed more than 170 such lawsuits. As detailed by The Assembly, Judge Martin Reidinger cited Oppenheimer’s big demands and high volume of cases before saying that he “appears to be using the copyright laws as a source of revenue, rather than as redress for legitimate injury.”
A year earlier, a New York federal judge used harsher language about Richard Liebowitz, a Long Island attorney who filed thousands of such photo infringement cases. Judge Denise Cote labeled the lawyer a “copyright troll” — which she defined as someone who aims to win “quick” settlements that are “priced just low enough” that it makes financial sense to simply “pay the troll rather than defend the claim.”
“As evidenced by the astonishing volume of filings coupled with an astonishing rate of voluntary dismissals and quick settlements in Mr. Liebowitz’s cases in this district, it is undisputable that Mr. Liebowitz is a copyright troll,” the judge wrote in her 2018 decision.
In November 2021, Liebowitz was suspended from practicing law in New York over a pattern of misconduct, including “behavior that made a mockery of orderly litigation processes.” Earlier this year, he was disbarred by the state for failing to comply with court orders and making false statements.
According to federal court records, Liebowitz represented Zlozower in the vast majority of his copyright cases until 2021. In 2018, his firm filed nine lawsuits on behalf of the photographer, including one against Spotify over an image of Mötley Crüe on the band’s artist page. In the year 2019 alone, Liebowitz’s firm filed 14 more cases for Zlozower, including one against famed indie record store Amoeba Music.
According to Deal, many photographers face an “impossible position” on the modern internet: Allow for-profit businesses to exploit their works for free, or “insist on being properly compensated” and risk being labeled a “troll” when they take action in court. But even within that context of mass infringement, Deal says, Zlozower’s volume of litigation seems unusually high.
“The idea of one photographer filing an average of 5-6 cases per year strikes me as excessive,” Deal says, saying his own firm will only typically sue in a “very small percentage of cases” after exhausting every other option.
One of Zlozower’s earliest cases was filed against Mötley Crüe itself. Represented by Liebowitz, he accused the band in September 2016 of creating t-shirts and other concert merch for its 2014 “Final Tour” that were emblazoned with photos he had snapped of Nikki Sixx, Tommy Lee and other members during Crüe’s 1980s heyday. But unlike many such defendants, the band actually fought back.
During two years of litigation, attorneys for Mötley Crüe argued that the band had already paid decades earlier for the right to use those images, and that it had “continued to use them without objection ever since.” Crüe also filed its own countersuit, accusing Zlozower of infringing their trademarks and likenesses by using the band’s name and images to sell books and prints: “Zlozower never requested, nor received, consent to sell photographs depicting the likenesses of the band members of Mötley Crüe.”
But in 2020, the case against Crüe ended like many of Zlozower’s have: in a confidential settlement and the voluntary dismissal of the lawsuit, without a final ruling on the merits. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed in court filings.
Zlozower and his current attorney, Sanders, did not return requests for comment from Billboard.
Convicted pharma executive Martin Shkreli is firing back in a lawsuit over Wu-Tang Clan’s Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, arguing he had a legal right to retain copies of the one-of-a-kind album even after he handed it over to federal prosecutors.
The filing came a month after Shkreli was sued by PleasrDAO — a digital art collective that bought the album in 2021 after Shkreli was forced to forfeit it as part of his criminal case. The company is seeking an injunction barring him from leaking the album and forcing him to turn over any copies.
But in an opposition filing on Wednesday (July 24), Shkreli’s attorneys argued that he had been well within his rights when he made copies of the album before the forfeiture — and that he had not been required to turn those copies over to prosecutors.
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“Defendant continues to have the right to use them to this day,” Shkreli’s attorneys write.
PleasrDAO has argued a leak of the famously secret album would “irreparably harm” its value. But Shkreli’s attorneys say the feds made no promises to Pleasr that they were buying the only copy in existence.
“Plaintiff was well aware that its purchase of assets from did not include any promise or expectation of ‘exclusivity’ or ‘uniqueness,’” Shkreli’s lawyers write. “It bought a copy of a musical work that it knew was not unique, and cannot now claim to be irreparably harmed by the existence of its non-uniqueness.”
PleasrDAO sued Shkreli last month over the potential leak of the album, accusing him of violating both their purchase agreement and the federal forfeiture order. They also accused him of violating federal trade secrets law, which protects valuable proprietary information from misappropriation.
Wu-Tang’s legendary album was recorded in secret and published just once, on a CD secured in an engraved nickel and silver box. Though the group intended the bizarre trappings as a protest against the commodification of music, Shaolin later became the ultimate commodity. In 2015, Shkreli — soon to become infamous as the man who intentionally spiked the price of crucial AIDS medications — bought it at auction for $2 million.
When it was initially sold, Shaolin came with much-discussed stipulations — namely, that the one-of-a-kind album could not be released to the general public until 2103. But Shkreli’s lawyers say the deal granted him the right to “duplicate or replicate the work for private use.”
After Shkreli was convicted of securities fraud in 2017, he forfeited the album to federal prosecutors to help pay his multi-million dollar restitution sentence. Pleasr then bought the album from the government in 2021 for $4 million, and in 2024 acquired the copyrights and other rights to the album for another $750,000.
In Wednesday’s filing, Shkreli’s lawyers argued that when the government sold the album, it expressly told Pleasr that it would not “assume” any of the promises or guarantees that had been made in Shkreli’s original deal with Wu-Tang — including the claims about the album’s one-of-a-kind status.
“It would be fundamentally unfair for this court to restrict Shkreli from his permitted use of the work after the [government] explicitly disclaimed any warranties, described the assets as being sold “As-Is, Where-Is,” and listed only physical objects to be delivered on the sale of the assets,” his lawyers write.
A hearing on the potential injunction is set for next month. A rep for PleasrDAO’s attorneys did not immediately return a request for comment.
Billy Ray Cyrus lashed out at his estranged wife singer Firerose in an Instagram Story on Wednesday (July 24) after the leak of a tape in which it appeared that the 62-year-old “Achy Breaky Heart” star was lambasting Firerose (born Johanna Hodges), 37, during a heated argument in which he blamed the Australian vocalist for making him late to a show.
“Hell yeah, I was at my wit’s end,” Cyrus wrote in the Story. “As every day went by, I started realizing something was wrong. And that’s before I knew she was a fraud. I just knew something wasn’t right. That was before I knew she was David Hodges ex-wife. That’s before I knew her parents last name.”
The post continued, “I had no idea she was arrested for felony residential burglary. I saw before my very own eyes, everything I thought I knew about her, was a lie. She was trying to take over my career, my life and usurp the Cyrus name for her own gain. See you in court.”
It’s unclear who leaked the undated audio of the argument to Britain’s Daily Mail, but Cyrus’ divorce lawyers told ET that it was Firerose; at press time, a spokesperson for Firerose had no comment when asked by Billboard to respond to that claim.
In the 90-second recording — which Billboard has obtained — a hoarse-sounding man identified as Cyrus can be heard berating Firerose over his claims she made him late for an appearance. “It’s 9:15 you idiot,” he says. “I needed to leave two hours ago,” as the person identified as Firerose calmly responds, “No you didn’t, you can still leave.”
“Get the f–k out of here. I had to go when I was ready to go,” the man identified as Cyrus continues. “If you had just shut the f–k up. I’m not in no place to do a show. I had to go when I was ready to go! [sound of hands clapping together]. If you had just shut the f–k up!” Firerose asks Cyrus to “stop screaming” at her as the singer continues to blame his ex for making him late.
“If you would’ve left it alone when I told you, it’s done. Now I’m really f–king pissed. You once again showed me you will not listen. I don’t know who the f–k you think you are, but you will not f–king listen.” Cyrus then tells Firerose that their argument is about her being a “selfish b–ch,” telling her “I don’t think you’re real smart. I changed my damn mind on that s–t.” He then repeatedly called her a “b–tch” and a “dumb ass” and says, “you cannot continue to walk all over me and think that I’m gonna go out in public with your dumb ass and f–king have have you do s–t anywhere you want in front of whoever… you just f–ked up.”
Cyrus filed for divorce on May 22 citing “irreconcilable differences” and “inappropriate marital conduct” seven months after the couple married; they began dating in 2022 after years of friendship. In a follow-up filing on June 13 filing, Cyrus requested an emergency motion accusing Firerose of making nearly $100,000 in unauthorized “fraudulent” credit card charges while seeking a temporary restraining order to stop her, accusations her attorneys labeled “untrue.”
In a statement shared with Billboard, Cyrus’ divorce attorneys, Rose Palermo and Jason Talley of the firm Cheatham Palermo and Garrett said, “On behalf of our client, Billy Ray Cyrus, we wish to respond to Ms. Hodges recent release to the press in an apparent last-ditch effort to squeeze money out of Mr. Cyrus ahead of our court ordered mediation scheduled for next week.”
They added, “As we previously stated and released back in June, we regret that Ms. Hodges has chosen to litigate this 7-month marriage in the press and has left Mr. Cyrus with no recourse but to set the record straight, once again. Mr. Cyrus previously admitted in a court filing that he had been very vocally frustrated and angry with Ms. Hodges during their 7-month marriage as he began to uncover more and more of Ms. Hodges true motives for marrying him.”
In reference to the leaked audio, the attorneys said that Firerose — who has legally changed her name to Firerose — allegedly made the recording without telling Cyrus that he was being taped. “Of course, she was intentionally on her best behavior since she knew the recording was being made,” they wrote. “If Mr. Cyrus was truly the person that Ms. Hodges desires the court of public opinion to believe with the release of her one-sided recording, then it is mindboggling to try and explain why Ms. Hodges begged to return to live with him and for Mr. Cyrus to give her a chance to ‘explain everything’ after he filed to annul or dissolve their marriage.”
The attorneys concluded, “Unfortunately, Ms. Hodges is attempting to litigate her case in the press for her own personal gain and in an attempt to harm our client’s longstanding career, as she promised she would do if he tried to divorce her, which Mr. Cyrus alleged in a previous court filing. At this point Ms. Hodges has played her last card, while Mr. Cyrus, on the other hand, has much more material to present to the Court to demonstrate the lies that she made public throughout these proceedings.”
After Cyrus’ divorce filing, Firerose accused him of domestic abuse, saying he was psychologically abusive during their marriage, calling the country singer “unpredictable and volatile” due to alleged substance abuse, adding the claim that he filed for divorce one day before she was scheduled to have a preventative double mastectomy. Cyrus’ lawyers “vehemently” denied the allegations, saying that while he was “certainly vocal, frustrated and angry with the defendant in May 2024, it is the plaintiff who, in fact, has been abused. Not only verbally and emotionally by the defendant, but PHYSICALLY.”
If you or someone you know are experiencing domestic violence, please call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 for confidential support.
Chris Brown and Live Nation are facing a second lawsuit over an alleged melee that took place backstage at a concert in Fort Worth last week, filed by a security guard who says he was “brutally and severely” beaten when he tried to break up the fight.
In a civil complaint filed Tuesday in Houston court, Frederick Overpeck accuses the singer of assault and battery over the alleged incident, in which Brown and members of his entourage allegedly brawled with four fans in the VIP area of the July 19 concert.
The lawsuit, which comes a day after the four alleged victims filed their own separate lawsuit, cites Brown’s “checkered past,” including a high-profile 2009 attack on his then-girlfriend Rihanna that led to a felony conviction.
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“The plaintiff herein is just the latest in a long line of individuals who have suffered at Brown’s hands,” Overpeck’s attorneys write. “This R&B performer lacks civility and boldly disregards life and health of anyone who he targets.”
According to the lawsuit, Overpeck says he witnessed Brown and his entourage attack the four men after the singer was reminded that he had “beef” with one of the alleged victims. “I don’t forget shit,” Brown allegedly said to the four men, before instructing his entourage to “fuck em up.”
Working as a security guard, Overpeck says he attempted to “de-escalate” the situation and “intervene to stop the violence,” but was “thrown out of the way” as “chairs and punches started flying.” During the fight, Overpeck says he was repeatedly kicked and that one of Brown’s men jumped on top of him.
The “brutal assault” left Overpeck with “crippling neck injuries,” the lawsuit claims, including a fractured neck that has left him unable to work and needing “extensive medical treatment.”
The lawsuit also names three members of his entourage — Conway, Hood Boss (a.k.a. Omololu Omari Akinlolu) and Sinko Ceej — as defendants. It also names tour promoter Live Nation as a defendant, accusing the company of negligence for failing to protect him despite Brown’s history of violent behavior.
The lawsuit is seeking “no less” than $15 million in damages, but such demands have little bearing on how much money is eventually awarded if a lawsuit is ultimately successful.
The case largely echoes claims made a day earlier in a separate by the four fans allegedly attacked by Brown — Larry Parker, Joseph Lewis, Charles Bush and Damarcus Powell. In that case, a Houston judge has already issued a temporary restraining order barring Brown and others from destroying any videos of the alleged incident and requiring them to hand over such evidence.
In Wednesday’s new lawsuit, attorneys for Overpeck referenced that court order – and said that they believe a video of the fight exists: “The initial assault, wherein Brown is clearly shown throwing the first punch, is captured on video. A temporary restraining order has now been entered to preserve such video.”
Brown was accused of co-conspiring, aiding and abetting in a 2017 sexual assault that took place during a party at his house in a lawsuit filed by attorney Gloria Allred on behalf of her client, a woman who will be known as Jane Doe.
According to the lawsuit, a copy of which was reviewed by Billboard, Doe had attended a concert at 1 Oak in West Hollywood, where she was invited to attend an after party at a recording studio where Brown and rapper Young Lo — whose real name is Lowell Grissom, Jr. — were working. When she arrived there, her phone was allegedly taken from her because Brown did not want any phones in the studio. Even when Doe wanted to leave, she claims her phone was not returned and she was then coerced into going to Brown’s house in order to retrieve her phone.
While at Brown’s house, the plaintiff claims alcohol and illicit drugs that she believed include cocaine, molly and marijuana were provided to guests. She also says Brown handed each female guest, including herself, a pill filled with white powder and instructed them to take it to have a “good time.” Doe did not take her pill and instead sought to isolate herself in hopes she would be left alone.
Meanwhile, according to the filing, Doe’s mother — with whom she is usually in close contact — became worried because she had not heard from her daughter and used an app to track the phone’s location to Brown’s house. Using that information, she called the police asking they go search for her daughter. The police did show up, but Brown refused to open the gate and denied them entry to his property.
The police left and the party continued, while Doe claims Grissom was “evasive” and would not return her phone. From there, things took a turn for the worse. The plaintiff alleges that Brown, Grissom, a female guest referred to as Doe X — who is believed to be friends with Brown and Grissom and to have toured with them — and others planned to use drugs, alcohol and intimidation to “coerce and force unwilling female guests to perform sexual acts for Defendants and others.” They allegedly lured the female guests into a bedroom and then falsely imprisoned those unwilling to voluntarily engage in sexual activity by going so far as to barricade the door and then further “coerce, intimidate and sexually harass the unwilling female guests to commit sexual acts” on the defendants and others.
Brown, Grissom, Doe X and other unnamed defendants were accused of sexual battery, gender violence, hate violence, assault, interference with exercise of civil rights, intentional infliction of emotional distress and more.
The new judge in Young Thug’s sprawling Atlanta gang trial has been greeted by a flood of new motions, including a renewed demand to release the rapper from the “torturous conditions” he’s faced while sitting in jail for more than two years.
A week after Judge Paige Reese Whitaker took the reins in the massive racketeering case, Thug’s attorney Brian Steel asked her on Tuesday (July 23) to release the rapper on bond and allow him to live under house arrest with strict monitoring until a verdict is reached.
Judge Ural Glanville, who was removed from the case earlier this month after revelations of a secret meeting with prosecutors and a key witness, has repeatedly denied such requests. In his new motion, Steel told Whitaker that those rulings had forced Thug to “languish” in jail for years without ever being convicted of a crime.
“The most fundamental premise of our criminal justice system is that the criminally accused cannot be punished for an offense until the prosecution proves guilt beyond a reasonable doubt,” Steel told the new judge in his filing. “In our society, liberty is the norm.”
Thug (Jeffery Williams) and dozens of others were indicted in May 2022 over allegations that their 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.
The trial kicked off in January 2023 but has faced repeated delays and disruptions, including an unprecedented 10-month jury selection, the stabbing of another defendant and now the removal of the presiding judge. Prosecutors have only presented part of their vast list of potential witnesses, and the case is expected to run well into 2025.
Since being arrested on the day the indictment was released, Thug has sat in jail. Steel has repeatedly asked for pre-trial release, but Glanville rejected those requests after Fulton County prosecutors warned that the rapper might intimidate witnesses if granted bond. At a hearing last year, the judge ruled that Thug posed “a significant risk to the community.”
In Tuesday’s motion, Steel urged Whitaker to reject those concerns, repeating his previous promises that Thug would submit to strict conditions under house arrest. Steel said those conditions include the use of electronic monitoring, the hiring of off-duty police officers to guard him, subjecting all communications to monitoring and requiring searches of all people entering the home.
“This will prevent any possibility to intimidate a witness or otherwise obstruct the administration of justice,” Steel wrote. “With these parameters in mind, it cannot be said that Mr. Williams would be a threat or a danger to the community or any person or property in the community.”
Thug’s conditions while “languishing in the county jail” have been “tortuous,” Steel wrote — including 22 hours of daily isolation, “inedible food” and an “ant infested room” from which he cannot see out the windows.
“Ordering Mr. Williams to wear an ankle monitor and to be in ‘total lockdown’ in his home is the equivalent to custody and confinement and has been deemed lawful confinement without the punishment imposed by the current county jail conditions wrongly imposed on Mr. Williams,” Steel wrote.
In addition to Thug’s renewed motion for bond, Whitaker is also facing a flood of other motions as she takes over the case, including multiple requests to declare a mistrial.
Echoing a similar motion already filed by Thug’s legal team earlier this month, attorneys for Yak Gotti (Deamonte Kendrick) argued in a Tuesday filing that Glanville’s secret meeting with prosecutors was an “egregious violation” and grounds for an immediate mistrial: “Kendrick’s Constitutional rights were violated when neither he nor his attorneys were present at a critical stage of the proceedings,” attorney Doug Weinstein wrote.
Attorneys for Quamarvious Nichols, another YSL defendant, made a different argument for a mistrial: that a brand new judge could not possibly “make informed rulings” after missing the first 19 months of trial in which over 100 witnesses had already testified.
“Trials evolve and decisions are made by the court based in part on the way the trial and evidence play out over time,” attorney Bruce Harvey wrote. “This Court has missed crucial proceedings necessary to make fair and well-founded rulings and to properly instruct the jury both during and at the conclusion of trial.”
Whitaker is facing new filings from prosecutors, too. In a motion filed Tuesday, the Fulton County District Attorney’s office asked the judge to order defense attorneys to stop making “extrajudicial statements to the media” about the case, arguing that it could have a “prejudicial effect” on jurors. Prosecutors cited specific statements allegedly made by Steel, Weinstein and other defense lawyers to media outlets.
Whitaker has set a hearing date for next week to hear and potentially decide the various new motions.