Pick a Day

Music History Events: Legal Issues

September 24, 1993 Guns N' Roses founding member Steven Adler agrees to a $2.5 million settlement in a lawsuit brought against the band and their managers. Adler signed away his interest in the band when he left in 1990 but claimed he was seriously impaired at the time and was taken advantage of.

August 23, 1993 News of Michael Jackson's child molestation investigation is finally made public by the Los Angeles police.

August 21, 1993 John Denver blows a .14 when his Porsche is pulled over in Aspen, Colorado, where the legal limit is .10. He pleads guilty to driving while impaired and is sentenced to 28 hours of community service, which includes performing a benefit concert for the Tipsy Taxi service.

August 17, 1993 While in therapy, Jordan Chandler, the 13-year-old son of a Beverly Hills dentist, alleges that singer Michael Jackson molested him while he visited Jackson's Neverland Ranch. The resultant civil suit costs Jackson over $20 million, but no criminal charges are filed, with Jackson's lawyers claiming the family in question had previously attempted to extort the singer.

June 4, 1993 Police are called to a domestic dispute at the house of Kurt Cobain and Courtney Love, and the Nirvana lead singer is arrested. Cobain claims that reports of him choking his wife are false, and that police were called because they were playing music too loud.

May 26, 1993 Singapore lifts its decades-old ban on the music of The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Creedence Clearwater Revival, and Chicago.

May 6, 1993 The IRS confiscates personal property from Jerry Lee Lewis' home in Mississippi and later auctions it off to help pay the $1.6 million he owes in back taxes.

December 14, 1992 Merle Haggard, 55, files for bankruptcy on the same day that his wife gives birth to his sixth child, a son named Binion (Ben). Haggard, whose tax problems led to the filing, sells the copyrights to many of his songs to pay off the debt.

November 17, 1992 Jimmy Merchant and Herman Santiago, former members of Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, are awarded $4 million in back royalties from a music publisher for their 1956 hit "Why Do Fools Fall In Love?"

October 27, 1992 Bo Diddley sues the estate of his former manager, the now-deceased Martin Otelsberg, for $75,000 in misappropriated funds.

August 14, 1992 Wayne Newton, with debts of over $20 million, files for bankruptcy. Newton made millions entertaining in Las Vegas, but made some bad investments in the '80s that led to the filing.

July 27, 1992 Michael Jackson sues the London tabloid Daily Mirror over claims that too many plastic surgeries have left him permanently disfigured.

July 13, 1992 Jett Williams, illegitimate daughter of country legend Hank Williams, is granted partial royalties of his songs by a New York appeals court, adding to a ruling reached on July 5 that she should receive half of his estate.

June 12, 1992 Jordan and Danny of New Kids on the Block are acquitted in copyright-infringement charges stemming from their song "I'll Be Your Everything," which the estate of Percy Sledge claimed borrowed heavily from Sledge's 1975 song of the same name.

June 10, 1992 Model Kelly Emberg has her palimony suit against Rod Stewart thrown out.

June 4, 1992 Smokey Robinson's half sister, Rose Ella Jones, files a suit against Smokey claiming she had been cheated out of royalty payments from songs written during the 1980s.

June 2, 1992 Freedom Williams quits C and C Music Factory and files a $10 million fraud and breach of contract suit in New York against the group.

April 24, 1992 The Cleveland Orchestra sues Michael Jackson for $7 million after it discovers the singer used part of their recording of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony on his hit album Dangerous.

April 24, 1992 Problems for Wilson Pickett, who hits 86-year-old Pepe Ruiz with his car, which has open beer and vodka bottles in it.

April 1, 1992 Billy Idol pleads no contest to charges of misdemeanor assault and battery and is fined $2,000. The incident happened in October 1991, when Idol ended up in a car with two women and allegedly punched one of them. Alcohol was involved.

January 24, 1992 Gregory McPherson, the former music director for New Kids On The Block, claims the group did "no more than 20 percent" of the singing on their albums, alleging that their producer, Maurice Starr, did the lead vocals along with Starr's brother. The Kids countersue for defamation and McPherson recants the accusation.

December 23, 1991 James Brown sues the producers of the movie The Commitments, claiming his name and likeness were used without his permission (he loses the case five years later).

December 9, 1991 A long legal battle over Bob Marley's estate ends when the nearly $12 million estate is awarded to his widow, Rita, and her children. In honor of the verdict, son Ziggy names his daughter, who was born that day, Justice Marley.

December 2, 1991 The US Supreme Court rules that The Shirelles, Gene Pitney and B.J. Thomas are owed $1.2 million in unpaid royalties.

November 20, 1991 Randy Jackson of The Jacksons is sentenced to a month in a Los Angeles jail for violating his probation for spousal abuse.

October 17, 1991 Sixties British singer Sandie Shaw is arrested and fined 100 pounds for refusing to take a breathalyzer test outside her home in London.

September 3, 1991 Ike Turner is released from prison after serving 14 months for cocaine possession.

August 18, 1991 Billy Preston is arrested on charges of battery after allegedly attacking a 16-year-old prostitute once Preston discovered he was a transvestite. The keyboardist and singer is eventually given five years probation.

February 27, 1991 James Brown is released on parole from a South Carolina prison after serving two years of a six-year sentence on drug and assault charges.

February 15, 1991 Rod Stewart's ex-girlfriend, supermodel Kelly Emberg, files a $25 million palimony suit against the singer in Los Angeles Superior Court.