A songwriter suing Missy Elliot can’t use her movie star standing as courtroom ammo after a choose dominated her wealth it’s off limits.
Missy Elliott is within the thick of a authorized mess in Philly, the place her outdated songwriting buddy Terry Williams is attempting to money in on songs from their 90s woman group days with SISTA—and a choose simply instructed him to depart her checking account out of it.
Williams claims he helped write a bunch of tracks for SISTA’s album 4 All The Sistas Round da World and says he’s owed credit score and a reduce of the cash.
Missy’s not having it and says she wrote these joints solo. The authorized back-and-forth has been dragging on for years and now it’s landed in federal court docket.
However right here’s the place it will get spicy—final week, Choose Nitza Quiñones Alejandro instructed Williams he can’t use Missy Elliott’s fame or cash to attempt to beef up his case.
The court docket mentioned speaking about her movie star standing or different music work that’s unrelated to the songs in query might mess with the jury’s judgment and is generally off-limits.
The choose spelled it out.
“References to Elliott’s wealth, fame, and different works have little to no relevance to this case, and that the probative worth of this proof is outweighed by a hazard of unfair prejudice,” Choose Alejandro mentioned.
Williams tried to argue that since Missy talked about her profession publicly, her success ought to issue into the trial. The choose wasn’t shopping for it and mentioned that also doesn’t make it truthful recreation.
“Williams can’t use Elliott’s wealth to unfairly inflate his compensatory damages claims. References to Elliott’s wealth, fame, and different works are usually inadmissible,” Choose Alejandro dominated.
That mentioned, the choose left somewhat wiggle room.
If Missy’s background connects on to the songs they’re preventing about, it would come up—however provided that it really issues to the case.
Whether or not that makes it into trial continues to be TBD.
This drama additionally features a stash of 34 unreleased tracks that Williams says he labored on. Missy says she wrote all of them herself.
Again in August 2024, Missy scored a win when the choose threw out Williams’ lawsuit over Aaliyah’s music “Heartbroken,” saying he waited method too lengthy—22 years—to assert he helped write it.
That a part of the case is useless, however the SISTA combat continues to be going.
