Court overturns Quincy Jones’ win in MJ lawsuit

a California appeals court on Tuesday overturned most of a 2017 jury verdict awarding Quincy Jones $9.4 million in royalties and fees from the Michael Jackson estate over the use of Jones-produced Jackson hits in the concert film This Is It and two Cirque du Soleil shows.

The state’s 2nd District Court of Appeal ruled that the jury misinterpreted a contract that was the judge’s job to interpret anyway. It took away $6.9 million that jurors had said MJJ Productions owed Jones for his work on Billie Jean, Thriller, and more of Jackson’s biggest hits.

The appeals court found that the jury wrongly granted Jones money from licensing fees, wrongly went beyond the 10% royalty rate Jones was owed for record sales, and incorrectly granted Jones money for remixes of Jackson’s master recordings.

The court kept intact $2.5 million of the award, which Jones said he was owed for the use of his masters in This Is It and other fees. Jones, who was already a music business giant when he produced the classic Jackson albums Off the Wall, Thriller and Bad, had sought $30 million from the estate when he first filed the lawsuit in 2013.

“Quincy Jones was the last person we thought would try to take advantage of Michael Jackson by filing a lawsuit three years after he died asking for tens of millions of dollars he wasn’t entitled to,” Jackson attorney Howard Weitzman said. “We knew the verdict was wrong when we heard it, and the court of appeal has completely vindicated us.”

“So many people have tried to take advantage of Michael and mischaracterize him since his death,” Jackson estate co-executor John Branca said on Tuesday. “It’s gratifying that in this case the court in an overwhelmingly favourable and just decision, recognises that Michael was both an enormous talent and an extremely fair business executive.”

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