Universal Music and its CEO Lucian Grainge last week filed a scathing response to the allegations made against them in the Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs lawsuit that was launched by producer Rodney ‘Lil Rod’ Jones Jr last month.
As well as denying all the allegations, the music company also hit out at Jones’ lawyer Tyrone A Blackburn. “A licence to practice law is a privilege”, said Universal’s new court filing. “Mr Blackburn has misused that licence to self-promote, gratuitously, falsely and recklessly accusing the UMG defendants of criminal behaviour. Mr Blackburn has conducted no good faith inquiry into the facts, instead pleading only demonstrably false conclusions”.
The lawyer, Universal added, is obliged to undertake an inquiry that any “factual contentions” in a lawsuit “have evidentiary support” under what is called Rule Eleven of the Federal Rules Of Civil Procedure. As a result of his failure to do so, last week’s legal filing added, “the UMG defendants will be filing a Rule Eleven motion in this case against plaintiff and Mr Blackburn”.
The new legal filing was made in the wake of the raids by US Homeland Security on two properties owned by Combs, seemingly as part of a federal sex trafficking investigation. The raids put Jones’ lawsuit – including the specific allegations he made against Universal Music – back into the spotlight.
Noting that Jones and his lawyer have “made criminal accusations against Sean Combs and his associates”, Universal’s legal filing stated, “Whatever the truth or falsity of those accusations, without the slightest factual or legal basis and in reckless disregard for Rule Eleven, they have also improperly accused Grainge, UMG Recordings and Motown of assisting, participating in or helping to conceal the alleged conduct of Combs and his associates”.
Jones worked with Combs on 2023’s ‘The Love Album’, which was released in partnership with Universal and its Motown label. He accuses Combs and his associates of sexual harassment and assault, and other unlawful conduct.
Universal and Grainge are also listed as defendants on his lawsuit, which claims that Universal sponsored, and Grainge attended, listening parties at the hip hop mogul’s LA home where sex workers and underage girls were present, and the drinks of female guests were routinely drugged.
“Grainge knew or should have known that Mr Combs was drugging the attendees through laced bottles of DeLeon Tequila and Ciroc Vodka”, the lawsuit stated. “As a sponsor of these events, defendant Grainge had a duty and obligation to ensure that sex workers and underaged girls were not present, and that Mr Combs was not spiking the alcohol with date rape drugs”.
However, Universal’s response insisted, “Grainge has never been in any of Combs’ homes”. Former Motown CEO Ethiopia Habtemariam – who was originally also a defendant on the lawsuit, but was recently removed – did visit Combs’ LA home four times for business meetings, but these were all before Jones began working with the musician.
Therefore, “plaintiff never saw Grainge or Habtemariam at any of Combs’ homes”, the legal filing continued, before adding that neither Grainge nor Habtemariam had “any knowledge, nor any way of knowing, of any alleged [unlawful] activity and no duty to control Combs”.
So much so, the legal filing then revealed, those allegations have been “jettisoned” from an amended lawsuit that Jones’ lawyer is now seeking to submit to the court, after he was “put on notice of the falsity of these assertions”.
Both the original and amended lawsuit, the major concluded, contain “knowingly false allegations, publicly smearing the UMG defendants”, and – as a result – all claims against the major and its boss should be dismissed.