Jay-Z has today (February 25) ended his legal battle with producer Chauncey Mahan, who tried to sue the rapper over copyright laws last year in 2015.
Mahan worked with Jay Z between 1998 and 2000, and claimed co ownership of 45 Jay Z songs, including the heavily contested ‘Big Pimpin’.
According to Billboard, an appeals court has today upheld the decision that the lawsuit be dismissed, saying Mahan had waited too long to sue. According to official court reports, Mahan must reportedly pay defendants’ attorney fees for his initial loss plus additional fees and costs for the appeal. Jay Z’s lawyers previously argued that Mahan’s “claims are plainly barred by the three-year statute of limitations contained in the Copyright Act, and have been for more than a decade.”
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Police originally confiscated a collection of lost Jay Z master recordings from the producer.
TMZ claims that producer Producer Chancey Mahan, who worked with Jay Z from 2008 to 2009, was allegedly found in possession of Roc-A-Fella Records master recordings from 1998 to 2002.
According to the report, Jay Z’s Roc-A-Fella Records recorded a series of master recordings between 1998 to 2002. However, in 2002 the masters went missing and the rapper and his team believed they had been lost.
On Friday April 18 2015, Mahan allegedly contacted promoter Live Nation – which is a partner in Jay Z’s Roc Nation record label – to say he had a number of the tapes in a storage facility in California and that he would either auction them or give them the tapes for a $100,000 “storage fee”. He is believed to eventually agreed on $75,000.
The producer then reportedly went to the storage facility to agree the deal, but found police waiting for him, where they detained him for questioning. The report claims he let LAPD take possession of the tapes until a judge determines ownership.