Grammy-winning producer Jermaine Dupri has filed a lawsuit against Sony Music Entertainment, accusing the label of systematically underpaying him and hiding royalties earned from his work with some of the biggest names in music, including Mariah Carey, Usher, Kris Kross, Xscape, Bow Wow, and Da Brat.
Filed in federal court in Manhattan, the complaint seeks at least $18 million in damages and paints a picture of a decades-long accounting scheme the producer says was deliberately kept from him.
Dupri, the Atlanta-based hitmaker widely credited with helping define the sound of Nineties hip-hop and R&B through his So So Def label, alleges that Sony Music was fully aware it was breaching its contractual obligations to him but chose to stay silent rather than come clean about its accounting practices.
The 13-page filing accuses the label of engaging in a consistent pattern of underreporting royalties, failing to report them at all in some cases, and quietly revising past statements to reflect earnings that should have been disclosed long before. According to court documents, this behavior amounted to willful and deceptive conduct intended to damage Dupri’s business interests.
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