Ol’ Dirty Bastard’s WIdow Files $1M Suit Claiming Estate is Owed Wu-Tang Royalties

The widow of Wu-Tang Clan’s Ol’ Dirty Bastard has filed a $1 million lawsuit claiming the band production company hasn’t paid the estate since 2011 and the estate is owed millions.

via Page Six:

Icelene Jones, ODB’s estate administrator, brought a case against Wu-Tang Productions, Inc. — which is run by the late rapper’s cousin Bobby “RZA” Diggs — alleging it breached an agreement signed in 1992, according to the Manhattan Supreme Court lawsuit.

Jones says under the agreement ODB — whose real name is Russell Jones — and three other band members Dennis “Ghostface Killah” Coles, Corey “Raekwon” Woods and Gary “GZA” Grice, were all supposed to receive 50 percent of royalties from their music.

Jones was entitled to royalties from merchandising including clothes, tv shows, products, videos and other uses of his image and name under the agreement, the filing claims.

But, “despite its repeated efforts and requests, the estate has been unable to obtain payments and accountings from the defendant under the recording agreement for the sale of Wu-Tang Clan Recordings and ODB recordings since at least 2011,” the suit charges.

While there was one $130,000 payment made on July 6, 2021, and “certain payments” made by Warner-Tamerlane Publishing Corp. in 2019 and 2020, those “represent only a small percentage of amounts payable to the estate under the recording agreement,” the court papers allege.

Jones’s widow is seeking at least $1 million in damages. He died in November 2004.

Diggs said “it’s unfortunate” that Jones filed the suit when “we have been very supportive in providing economically to the family through the estate and to his wife and children on record and off record.”

“We are a phone call away,” Diggs said.

“ODB’s potential share of those records are minimal, are dismal, but nevertheless after those products are recouped his prorated portion belongs to him,” Diggs said.

When pressed about whether the company was behind on the payments Diggs answered: “I don’t do the accounting, so I can’t say.”

They need to go ahead and run her that money.