Legal
Page: 43
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.
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: Michael Jackson’s estate scores a victory in litigation over a $600 million catalog sale; Snoop Dogg is hit with a copyright lawsuit that cites Tracy Chapman; Melissa Etheridge faces a legal battle from her partners in her failed cannabis business; and much more.
THE BIG STORY: Jackson Estate Scores Legal Victory
Michael Jackson’s estate won a key ruling last week in a legal battle with the late singer’s mother — and though it’s only a “tentative” win, the stakes are enormous. More than 15 years after Jackson’s death, his estate is still tied up in probate court, reportedly over unresolved tax issues. So when the King of Pop’s executors wanted to sell part of his catalog to Sony Music for more than $600 million, it asked a California judge for approval to do so. Katherine Jackson objected, arguing that the sale “violated Michael’s wishes” and that the catalog would likely continue to gain value over time if retained, among other arguments. Last week, a California appeals court tentatively rejected Katherine’s objections — ruling that it would likely rule for the estate both procedurally (that she had failed to preserve arguments on appeal) and substantively (that the estate’s executors had the power to make the Sony deal.)Go read our full story on the decision — and stay tuned for whether the court decides to finalize its ruling.
Other top stories this week…
LEGAL LEGEND – While we’re on the subject of the Jackson estate, go read Frank DiGiacomo’s excellent profile of estate co-executor John Branca, a music attorney who at various points in his career has represented Bob Dylan, The Beach Boys, Paul McCartney, the Elvis Presley estate and The Rolling Stones. SNOOP LIABILITY – Snoop Dogg was sued for copyright infringement over allegations that the legendary rapper has refused to pay a veteran studio musician after using two of his backing tracks. The case offers a glimpse at industry practices surrounding the use of uncleared samples to privately “experiment” in the recording studio — and cites an earlier battle between Tracy Chapman and Nicki Minaj over that same issue. WEED WAR – Melissa Etheridge is facing a legal battle over her brief foray into the cannabis business, filed by two business partners in Northern California (Josephine and D’Angelo Roberto) who say they “invested their life’s work into the businesses” but claim the singer “abandoned them” and left them in “financial ruin.” AN “ABHORRENT SCHEME”– Attorneys for Priscilla Presley filed a lawsuit against four of her former business partners over allegations of elder abuse and fraud, accusing them of a “meticulously planned” scheme to drain Elvis Presley’s ex-wife of “every last penny she had” — including nearly $1 million to date and 80% of her future income.ANOTHER DAY, ANOTHER JUDGE – Just two days after Judge Ural Glanville was ordered removed from Young Thug’s sprawling Atlanta gang trial, his replacement on the trial bench (Judge Shukura L. Ingram) said that she would also recuse herself. Later the same day, Judge Paige Reese Whitaker assumed control of the massive racketeering case and now appears to be settling in to run it for the long haul. KANYE SUED AGAIN – Ye (formerly Kanye West) was sued yet again over claims of illegal sampling, this time over allegations that he used an instrumental track called “MSD PT2” in two songs from the album Donda even after he was explicitly denied permission. The case closely echoes a lawsuit filed against him by the estate of Donna Summer, which similarly claimed that he had used one of her songs even after being directly refused a license. That case settled last month. GOSSIP OR DEFAMATION? Soulja Boy launched a defamation lawsuit against social media personalities Tasha K and William The Baddest, claiming that they made false statements on a podcast about the rapper having a sexual encounter with a man — or, in the words of his lawyers, “redefining his character as a man who is not straight.” If Tasha K’s name sounds familiar, it should: She’s the gossip host who Cardi B sued for defamation over claims about STDs, drug use and prostitution, eventually winning a $4 million judgment. NBA MUSIC LAWSUITS – More than a dozen NBA teams were sued for copyright infringement by Kobalt and other music companies over allegations that the basketball teams used songs in social media videos without permission. The cases came with city-specific flair: The New York Knicks were accused of using songs by “New York legends” Jay-Z and Cardi B; the Philadelphia 76ers allegedly used music from Philly native Meek Mill; and the Atlanta Hawks took songs by “Atlanta’s own” Migos and OutKast. MUSIC AI BATTLES – How are the copyright lawsuits against AI music firms Suno and Udio going to shake out? Billboard’s Robert Levine breaks down the fair use doctrine and how it might be applied to the new frontier of training artificial intelligence models, particularly in the wake of high-profile cases involving Google Books, the Android operating system and an Andy Warhol print of Prince. ROYALTY ROW – SoundExchange sued a free streaming service called AccuRadio over allegations that the company has failed to pay royalties for music for years, claiming the streamer has “directly harmed creators.” The small streamer denied the allegations, saying it had reliably paid $12.5 million in royalties over the years but was struggling with high rates imposed on online radio. BACKSTAGE MELEE – Chris Brown, Live Nation and several members of his entourage were hit with a lawsuit over an alleged assault that took place following Brown’s concert last week in Fort Worth, Texas. The case claims that Brown and others “brutally and severely beat” four men backstage in an unprovoked attack following the show. CHIPPING AWAY – Attorneys for Live Nation asked a federal judge to dismiss part of the Justice Department’s antitrust lawsuit — specifically, that the concert promoter uses illegal tying arrangements to operate its amphitheaters. The company argued that this practice, described as a “refusal to deal,” is common in the concert business and protected by Supreme Court precedent.
Trending on Billboard
Chris Brown and several members of his entourage, along with Brown’s 11:11 Tour promoter Live Nation, are facing a lawsuit over an alleged assault that took place following Brown’s concert in Fort Worth, Texas, on Friday night.
Filed Monday (July 22) in Harris County district court by attorneys Tony Buzbee and Caroline Adams, the lawsuit claims that Brown and several accomplices “brutally and severely beat” four men — Larry Parker, Joseph Lewis, Charles Bush and Damarcus Powell — backstage at Dickies Arena in an unprovoked attack following the show.
“The violence included Brown and his entourage surrounding the Plaintiffs, throwing chairs at them, and repeatedly kicking, stomping, and beating them,” the complaint reads. “The unprovoked violence included multiple strikes to the Plaintiffs’ heads and chests, and ultimately involved stomping them while they were down. The brutal, violent assault participated in and directed by Brown, severely injured all Plaintiffs.”
Trending on Billboard
According to the complaint, the attack occurred after the four men were invited to the backstage VIP area following the show, where they allegedly waited 30 minutes for Brown to arrive. “Having grown tired of waiting,” the complaint reads, the men began making their way to the exit, at which point Bush says he approached Brown to shake his hand and congratulate him on the concert. After exchanging pleasantries, a member of Brown’s crew then allegedly shouted to Brown, “Man, you don’t remember you two were beefing?” The lawsuit claims that Brown then replied, “Oh yeah, we were…I don’t forget sh–” before instructing his entourage to “f—” Bush up.
At that point, the plaintiffs claim that Brown, along with “seven to ten members” of his crew, followed them into a hallway as they were attempting to leave and attacked them. “One of Brown’s entourage, known by the alias Sinko, ran to the left side of the crowd and punched Bush in the chest,” the complaint reads. “Simultaneously, another of Brown’s entourage, stage alias Hood Boss, picked up a chair and threw it at Bush’s head.”
The complaint says that Parker was also badly beaten after Brown allegedly instructed another member of his entourage, Markies Deandre Conway (a.k.a. Yella Beezy), and several others to “f—” him up. After fleeing into a stairwell, the lawsuit claims Parker became trapped by a locked door at the bottom of the stairs, where he was subsequently attacked by Brown and several other men.
“Upon instruction by Brown, Parker was then punched in the face and chest, kicked in the head for over ten minutes, and stomped on by Defendant Brown and his associates,” the complaint alleges. “Brown encouraged his companions to join in the assault simultaneously. Brown and his entourage then continued to beat Plaintiff Parker closed fisted for almost minutes, repeatedly stomping on Defendant Parker’s head, kicking his face and ribs, and causing severe bodily injury.”
Brown and his crew are also accused of punching Powell in the shoulder and punching Lewis in the shoulder and chest.
The complaint claims that all four men required medical treatment and that Parker was hospitalized and “will need to undergo extensive medical treatment for the damages he suffered in the attack, including head injuries.”
In addition to Brown, the lawsuit names three members of his entourage — Conway, Hood Boss (a.k.a. Omololu Omari Akinlolu) and Sinko Ceej — as defendants. As for Live Nation, the complaint alleges that the concert promoter continued working with Brown despite his history of “bad conduct and violent conduct.” According to the lawsuit, the company “shamelessly profits and promotes Brown’s The 11:11 Tour and brought Brown to Texas for financial gain. Live Nation failed to insure that the [participants] of the concert who may be around Brown, and his associates, were safe.”
The plaintiffs are asking for compensatory and punitive damages “in excess [of] $50 million,” along with actual damages for “pecuniary losses, pain and suffering, disfigurement, mental anguish, and past, present, and future medical expenses,” among other relief.
In making its case, the plaintiffs’ attorneys make note of several of the defendants’ criminal histories, alleging that Ceej was a member of “the blood gang” and spent “at least eight years in prison” and that Conway, “a former Crip gang member,” has been arrested multiple times for firearm possession and sexual assault.
The lawsuit additionally recounts Brown’s well-publicized brushes with the law, including the singer’s guilty plea for beating his then-girlfriend Rihanna in 2009, for which he was sentenced to five years’ probation and community service and forced to undergo domestic violence counseling. Brown has been arrested and/or sued multiple times for various instances of alleged physical and sexual assault, including by multiple women and his former manager, Michael Guirguis. In 2014, Brown pleaded guilty to simple assault for punching a man in the face the previous year.
Representatives for Brown, Live Nation and Conway did not immediately respond to Billboard‘s requests for comment. Representatives for Akinlolu and Ceej could not be located for comment.
SoundExchange is suing a free streaming service called AccuRadio over allegations that the company failed to pay royalties for music, claiming the streamer has “directly harmed creators.”
In a lawsuit filed Friday in Washington D.C. federal court, SoundExchange accused AccuRadio of violating the federal law that governs how radio-like services pay royalties to record labels and artists for the right to publicly perform copyrighted sound recordings.
SoundExchange – the non-profit that collects and distributes such “statutory royalties” – says AccuRadio had always paid its full bill until 2016, when its payments “slowed” and then finally stopped in 2018.
“AccuRadio has directly harmed creators over the years by refusing to pay royalties for the use of protected recordings,” said Michael Huppe, SoundExchange’s president and CEO said in a statement on Monday. “Today, SoundExchange is standing up for creators through this lawsuit to protect the value of music and ensure creators are compensated fairly for their work. We hope AccuRadio will immediately reverse course and pay what they owe for the use of the music that sits at the foundation of its service.”
Trending on Billboard
Founded in 2000, AccuRadio boasts that it is “the only online music streaming service curated by human beings, not algorithms.” The company offers hundreds of ad-supported free music channels that users can further customize, including skipping songs they don’t like.
According to SoundExchange, after AccuRadio stopped paying its royalty bill, the two sides have attempted to negotiate a solution for years, including a so-called forbearance agreement last year in which the streamer agreed to make a set down payment and then regular additional payments. But after three months, SoundExchance claims AccuRadio defaulted on that agreement, too.
“The cumulative amount of defendant’s underpayment – which harms SoundExchange, as well as the performing artists and copyright owners on whose behalf it collects and distributes royalties – continues to grow with each passing month,” SoundExchange’s lawyers write in their complaint.
In addition to demanding payment, the lawsuit is seeking a preliminary injunction that would immediately force AccuRadio to either pay up or stop offering copyrighted music to its listenership.
“While defendant has defaulted on the payments due pursuant to the forbearance agreement, it continues to operate its multichannel internet radio service, providing access to over a thousand pre-developed music channels and access to millions of sound recordings,” the lawsuit reads. “Injunctive relief is reasonably necessary to stop defendant from abusing the statutory license and incurring further damages throughout the pendency of this litigation.”
AccuRadio did not immediately return a request for comment on Monday.
More than a dozen NBA teams are facing copyright lawsuits from Kobalt and other music companies over allegations that the basketball teams used songs in social media videos without permission.
In 14 separate actions filed in federal court Friday, Kobalt and others accused each club of using copyrighted music in promotional videos on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok and X (formerly Twitter) to “increase viewership” and “engage its fanbase.”
In the case against the New York Knicks, the music companies accused the team of using songs by “New York legends” Jay-Z and Cardi B. The case against the Philadelphia 76ers cited use of songs by Philly native Meek Mill. In the action against Atlanta Hawks, the complaint said the club had used music by “Atlanta’s own” Migos and OutKast.
But in each case, the overarching allegation was the same – that a sophisticated corporate entity had stolen music that it knew it was supposed to pay for.
Trending on Billboard
“Defendants are acutely aware of the protections that the copyright laws of the United States afford,” lawyers for the music companies wrote in language that appeared in each lawsuit. “[The team] utilizes the full extent of legal protections available for its own intellectual property while simultaneously knowingly and willfully infringing on the intellectual property rights of the plaintiffs.”
In addition to the Knicks, 76ers and Hawks, the lawsuits targeted the Cleveland Cavaliers, the Denver Nuggets, the Indiana Pacers, the Miami Heat, the Minnesota Timberwolves, the New Orleans Pelicans, the Orlando Magic, the Phoenix Suns, the Portland Trail Blazers, the Sacramento Kings and the San Antonio Spurs.
A spokesman for the NBA did not immediately return a request for comment.
The other music companies who signed onto the lawsuits include Artist Publishing Group, Notting Hill Music and Prescription Songs.
Social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok provide huge libraries of licensed music for users to add to their videos. But there’s a key exception: The songs can’t be used for commercial or promotional videos posted by brands. That kind of content requires a separate synch license, just like a conventional ad on television.
In recent years, music owners have cracked down on brands that blur those lines on social media. All three major labels sued drink maker Bang Energy for using hundreds of copyrighted songs in TikTok videos, with Universal and Sony eventually winning judgments. The owner of the “Space Jam” song has filed several lawsuits over the past year, including suing a minor league baseball team that used the famed 1990s track in a Facebook video. And earlier this month, the Beastie Boys sued the owner of Chili’s for using the trio’s “Sabotage” in social media clips that spoofed the song’s famous music video.
Sean Kingston and his mother have been indicted in South Florida on federal charges of committing more than $1 million worth of fraud.
Kingston, 34, and his mother, 61-year-old Janice Turner, made their first appearances Friday (July 19) in federal court, according to court records. A Miami grand jury returned an indictment earlier this month accusing Kingston and his mother of participating in a scheme to defraud victims of high-end specialty vehicles, jewelry and other goods through the use of fraudulent documents.
Kingston was booked into the Broward County jail on similar state charges last month following a May 23 arrest at Fort Irwin, an Army training base in California’s Mojave Desert where he was performing. Turner was arrested the same day as her son, when a SWAT team raided his rented mansion in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
According to the federal indictment, Kingston and Turner falsely claimed that they had executed bank wire or other monetary payment transfers for high-end items when no such transfers had taken place. Investigators said Kingston and Turner then kept over $1 million worth of fraudulently purchased items despite not paying for them.
Trending on Billboard
The warrants for the state charges say that from October to March, they stole almost $500,000 in jewelry, more than $200,000 from Bank of America, $160,000 from a Cadillac Escalade dealer, more than $100,000 from First Republic Bank and $86,000 from the maker of customized beds.
The Jamaican American performer had a No. 1 hit with “Beautiful Girls” in 2007 and collaborated with Justin Bieber on the song “Eenie Meenie.”
Robert Rosenblatt, an attorney for Kingston and his mother, didn’t immediately respond to a message seeking comment from The Associated Press. He previously said they looked forward to addressing the charges and were “confident of a successful resolution.”
Kingston, whose legal name is Kisean Anderson, was already serving a two-year probation sentence for trafficking stolen property.
His mother pleaded guilty in 2006 to bank fraud for stealing over $160,000 and served nearly 1.5 years in prison, according to federal court records.
Attorneys for Priscilla Presley are suing four of her former business partners over allegations of elder abuse and fraud, accusing them of a “meticulously planned” scheme to drain Elvis Presley’s ex-wife of “every last penny she had.”
In a complaint filed Thursday (July 18) in Los Angeles court, lawyers for Presley, 79, accuse Brigitte Kruse, Kevin Fialko, Vahe Sislyan and Lynn Walker Wright of fraudulently convincing her to give them power over nearly every aspect of her life — and then abusing that control to steal her money.
“This action arises out of a meticulously planned and abhorrent scheme by the defendants in this action to prey on an older woman by gaining her trust, isolating her from the most important people in her life, and duping her into believing that they would take care of her (personally and financially), while their real goal was to drain her of every last penny she had,” writes high-profile attorney Martin Singer, who now represents Presley.
Trending on Billboard
Calling Kruse a “con-artist and pathological liar,” Singer says the defendants took more than $1 million from Presley and convinced her to sign a deal that would give them 80% of her future income.
“The fact that the plaintiff in this case is internationally recognized actress, author, and cultural icon … demonstrates both how effective the defendants’ plan was (and needed to be), and how anyone can be a victim of elder abuse and fraud,” Singer writes.
The new case comes eight months after Kruse’s company, Priscilla Presley Partners, filed its own lawsuit against Priscilla in Florida. That case claimed that Presley illegally turned her back on Kruse and Fialko after they had helped her “dig herself out of impending financial ruin,” including negotiating the deal that led to last year’s Priscilla biopic.
But in Thursday’s new lawsuit, Singer argues that the earlier case was merely a cover for Kruse and Fialko’s alleged misdeeds.
“When it became clear to the defendants that their scheme had been uncovered, they attempted to falsely portray themselves as the victims by filing a lawsuit against Presley in Florida in the name of several of the sham companies they established, alleging that Presley breached the fraudulently-induced operating agreements,” her legal team writes.
According to the complaint, Sislyan is Kruse’s husband and participated in the scheme; and Walker-Wright is an Orlando-area attorney who allegedly helped the others carry it out.
Singer and Priscilla’s other attorneys say that Kruse and the others “established a personal relationship” with her and then used it to “isolate her from her long-time business and financial advisors,” whom they argued were “deceitful or incompetent” and causing her to lose money. Once they had isolated her, the lawsuit says, Kruse and the others took steps to “fraudulently induce” Presley into signing over power of attorney, giving them control over her trusts and bank accounts, and signing deals with “sham” companies like Priscilla Presley Partners.
One of those deals, the lawsuit says, gave the defendants “an exclusive license to exploit and profit off of her name, image, and likeness, and to control and receive virtually all of her income from any of her professional ventures.”
“Dissatisfied with what existing resources they could siphon from her, the defendants’ plan involved usurping control over her ability to control her finances going forward and forcing her into a form of indentured servitude, where plaintiff was forced to work so that they could receive the lion’s share of any revenue that she was able to earn in the future,” Singer writes.
An attorney for Kruse and Priscilla Presley Partners did not immediately return a request for comment on the allegations. Walker-Wright also did not return a request for comment.
Melissa Etheridge is facing a legal battle over her brief foray into the cannabis business, filed by two business partners in Northern California who claim that the singer “abandoned them” and left them in “financial ruin.”
The Grammy-winning songwriter, who rose to stardom in the 1990s with hits like “Come to My Window” and “I’m The Only One,” announced in 2019 that she would launch Etheridge Farms, which aimed to bring the benefits of cannabis to middle-aged women. “They’re looking to cannabis, and I want Etheridge Farms to be right there to answer what they’re looking for,” the singer said at the time.
But five years later, her former business partners now claim that Etheridge and her wife effectively torpedoed the company by refusing to support it. In a legal petition filed July 9 and obtained by Billboard, Josephine and D’Angelo Roberto say they’ve been “left with nothing.”
Trending on Billboard
“The Robertos trusted the Etheridges and invested their life’s work into the businesses,” writes attorney Christopher Frost of the law firm Frost LLP, representing the Robertos. “Unfortunately, their hard work did not end in a success story, but rather betrayal and abandonment.”
The filing is a demand for arbitration, which initiates a litigation-like case that will play out similar to a lawsuit. But such cases, often required under corporate operating agreements, are decided by an arbitrator behind closed doors rather than by a judge in an open courtroom.
Representatives for the Etheridges, including their attorney who received the arbitration demand, did not return repeated requests for comment on the dispute. Attorneys for the Robertos declined to comment.
A Budding Partnership
The Robertos (nicknamed Jozee and Cricket) say they met Etheridge and her wife Linda Wallem-Etheridge via mutual friends in Northern California in 2017, and that the foursome then hatched a plan to launch a series of cannabis businesses, including Etheridge Farms and Etheridge Botanicals. In a 2019 article in San Jose’s Mercury News, the singer said she had been inspired in part by using cannabis amid a battle with breast cancer in the 2000s.
“I came out of chemotherapy saying, I want to be an advocate for this, I believe in this as medicine so deeply,” she told the Mercury News. “I started looking around California going, OK, what do I need to do — I want to be part of this — I actually turned to my friends and said, I want to be the face of cannabis.” In that same article, Jozee was quoted as saying that the Etheridges “genuinely share the same values that Cricket and I share about health and wellbeing.”
According to legal filings, the group secured a rental lease in 2018 on a large facility in Soquel, Calif. to manufacture and distribute their products, and also locked down important regulatory licenses for that property.
The plan, according to the Robertos, was for the couple to contribute their extensive cannabis industry expertise and work on product development, while the Etheridges would use their celebrity status to promote the business, seek outside investors, and continue to support the business financially.
Left High and Dry?
But while the Robertos say they “devoted every ounce of their money, time and attention” to the businesses, they claim the Etheridges failed to do the same. They say she failed to promote the business, and then stopped supporting the business financially. According to legal filings, by 2020 that allegedly included failing to pay the rent at the Soquel facility as promised; when the landlord finally booted them, the Robertos say it cost the business crucial regulatory licenses that had been tied to that property.
“Despite their persistent efforts, following the Etheridges’ complete lack of engagement and financial support to the Etheridge entities, the LLC sales and performance eventually withered away,” attorneys for the couple write in the demand for arbitration.
The alleged breakdown in the business came amid great personal tragedy for Etheridge. In May 2020, the singer announced that Beckett Cypher, her son with former partner Julie Cypher, had died from causes related to opioid addiction. Months later, the singer launched the Etheridge Foundation to advocate for and support research into new treatments for opioid addiction.
Those tragic events are not directly mentioned in the new legal filings, but attorneys for the Robertos allude to them in making their case.
“The Etheridges suffered personal losses for which the Robertos have much empathy,” the couple’s lawyers write in their filing earlier this month. “However, notwithstanding these personal losses and given the challenges faced by the parties, the Etheridges ultimately decided to let all of the joint ventures ‘die on the vine,’ stopped covering expenses that they promised to pay, and left the Robertos in a much worse situation.”
In technical terms, the demand for arbitration accuses the Etheridges of breaching their fiduciary duty to the companies; breaching their contract with the Robertos; violating legal promises they made to the couple; and making fraudulent and negligent misrepresentations.
The pair are seeking an undetermined amount of damages, but say they’re entitled to at least $3 million: “The Robertos have not pursued this action and are not proceeding to arbitration for fame or fortune or as a vendetta,” their lawyers write. “Rather, they simply seek compensation for the suffering they have had to endure and the financial ruin they have experienced due to the Etheridges abandoning them.”
Michael Jackson’s estate has won a tentative court ruling that would allow it to proceed with a $600 million sale of the singer’s catalog to Sony Music, overcoming objections from his mother that aimed to block the deal.
Katherine Jackson had argued that the gargantuan deal violated the terms of Michael’s will, but a California appeals court tentatively ruled Wednesday (July 17) that she had “forfeited” that argument by failing to make it before a lower probate court.
Even if she had properly raised that argument, the appeals court said the estate’s executors had the power to make the deal. The court said Jackson’s will had vested the executors (John Branca and John McClain) with the authority to “sell, invest, or otherwise manage estate property” while they were in charge.
Trending on Billboard
“The court is tentatively inclined to affirm the probate court’s order granting the executors’ request to proceed with the proposed transaction,” the appeals court wrote in its ruling, obtained by Billboard. “We tentatively conclude that Katherine’s challenge fails on the merits because the probate court’s order does not violate the terms of Michael’s will.”
Such “tentative” rulings must be finalized before they are formally entered, but they strongly indicate the way the court is planning to rule. An attorney for Katherine did not return a request for comment on Thursday. A rep for the Jackson estate declined to comment. News of the tentative ruling was first reported by Rolling Stone.
As reported by Billboard earlier this year, the Jackson estate and Sony Music have reached a deal that will see the music giant buy half of the singer’s publishing and recorded masters catalog for more than $600 million.
But because the Jackson estate is still pending before a Los Angeles probate court more than 15 years after his 2009 death, his executors took the then-confidential deal to Judge Mitchell Beckloff for approval. When they did so, Katherine filed objections — among them that the sale “violated Michael’s wishes” and that the catalog would likely continue to gain value over time if retained.
In April 2023, Beckloff rejected those objections and ruled that the deal could move forward. Katherine then filed an appeal, resulting in Wednesday’s tentative decision.
The wrangling over the Sony deal has exposed rifts among Jackson’s heirs. In March, Jackson’s son Blanket asked the judge to stop his grandmother from using estate money to fund her efforts to block the Sony deal. Though both had initially opposed the sale, Blanket and Jackson’s other children accepted the probate judge’s decision allowing it to move forward.
Later that same week, the estate responded to claims from Katherine’s attorneys that she needed estate money to pay for her legal battle, arguing she had received more than $55 million since the singer’s death. The estate’s executors argued that “virtually no request of Mrs. Jackson for her care or maintenance has been declined,” including more than $33 million in cash.
As detailed in a Billboard feature profile this week, entertainment attorney John Branca represents many of pop music’s biggest legacy artists — most famously, the Michael Jackson estate, of which he is co-executor. But Branca is no lone wolf. His partners in the music department at Ziffren Brittenham — David Byrnes, David Lande, Mitch Tenzer and Kelly Vallon — make up, he says, “the most important contemporary music practice of any law firm in the world.” Certainly, along with Grubman Shire Meiselas & Sacks, and Taylor Swift attorney Donald S. Passman’s firm, Gang Tyre Ramer, it is one of the premier law firms for the music industry.
Lande primarily represents Selena Gomez, Pharrell Williams, SZA, Olivia Rodrigo, Rosalía and Justin Timberlake (when asked if Timberlake called him after his recent DUI arrest, Lande answers, “No, I called him”), and Byrnes’ principal clients include Travis Scott, Kelly Clarkson, Blake Shelton and the estates of Kurt Cobain, Mac Miller, Tom Petty and Eazy-E — hardly even an exhaustive list of their or the firm’s clients. But the partners all work collaboratively to serve the firm’s clientele, which also includes industry executives.
Trending on Billboard
For example, Byrnes and Lande represent Beyoncé as a team. Lande — who served as a tour manager and tour accountant for such artists as Elton John and Madonna during breaks from his undergraduate and law school years — says he was involved in every aspect of the 2023 Renaissance world tour, “from making the initial deal with Live Nation, reviewing all of the business plans, working with her and her team on what that business would look like as a tour, to ultimately its execution.” Byrnes, who worked on the MTV show I.R.S. Records Presents: The Cutting Edge and as an editor at the now-defunct music trade publication Cashbox, consulted with the firm’s film/TV department to negotiate deals for Beyoncé’s 2019 and 2020 films, Homecoming and Black Is King, respectively. Tenzer and Vallon work on many clients.
Given the depth and breadth of their music industry experience, legal and otherwise — Tenzer was director of business affairs at Sony Music, and Vallon’s résumé includes roles at CAA, AEG, several labels and The Colbert Report, for example — “We have really good market knowledge of what’s cutting edge and what’s achievable, and we all end up being business advisers to our clients — helping them think through deal structure and the kinds of deals they ought to do,” Lande says.
With more artists preferring independence over label deals and labels holding off on signing acts until they build a significant fan base, the deals before the firm’s music department have evolved significantly. “There’s a plethora of independent distributors and labels out there offering development-type deals, and we’re dealing with those every day,” Byrnes says.
And Lande explains that artists are now more interested in building long-term value through equity. “Years ago, it was just, ‘Pay me this amount of money and I will endorse your product or service,’ ” he says. Those deals still happen, but “more and more, our clients are entering joint ventures, funding things themselves and building businesses that capitalize on their celebrity in an organic way. They take more risk by doing that, and it takes a longer time to build value,” he continues. “But the ultimate payoff is significant.”
This story will appear in the July 20, 2024, issue of Billboard.