Quincy Jones loses Michael Jackson royalties case

A court has overturned a jury verdict that awarded producer Quincy Jones $US9.4m in royalties and fees from the ­Michael Jackson estate.

Michael Jackson, who died in 2009 at the age of 50.

A court has overturned a jury verdict that awarded producer Quincy Jones $US9.4m in royalties and fees from the ­Michael Jackson estate.

A California appeals court took away $US6.9m that jurors in 2017 had said Jones was owed for his production of 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 per cent royalty rate Jones was owed for record sales, and incorrectly granted Jones money for remixes of Jackson’s master recordings. The court kept intact $2.5m of the award, which Jones said he was owed for the use of his masters in the concert film This Is It, which was created from rehearsal footag e for a comeback tour that ­Jackson was working towards when he died in 2009 at age 50.  The court also rejected a ­counter-appeal from Jones, 87, ­arguing that the trial court could have ­allowed him to make a claim of ­financial elder abuse.

Jones, who was already a music business giant when he produced the classic Jackson albums Off the Wall, Thriller and Bad, had sought $30m from the estate when he first filed the lawsuit in 2013.

Music producer Quincy Jones. Picture: Kate Madison

“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 lawyer Howard Weitzman said on Tuesday. “We knew the verdict was wrong when we heard it, and the court of appeal has completely vindicated us.”

A representative for Jones did not comment.

Jones said at the time of the verdict that the lawsuit “was never about Michael, it was about protecting the integrity of the work we all did”.

On the stand during the trial, Jones was asked by Mr Weitzman whether he realised he was essentially suing Jackson himself.

Jones angrily disagreed.

“I’m not suing Michael,” he said. “I’m suing you all.”

The trial centred on the definitions of terms in the two contracts Jackson and Jones signed in 1978 and 1985.

AP