After a two-week trial, a Cook County jury took just a few hours to decide the musician’s former friend and business partner Pat Corcoran had failed to prove his claim that he had a contract entitling him to millions in unpaid commissions and royalties.
The five-year-plus legal battle between Chance The Rapper and his former manager, Pat Corcoran, ended Friday as a Cook County jury found Corcoran had failed to prove he was owed the $3.8 million in unpaid commissions and royalties he sought in his lawsuit against his former friend and business partner.
“I claim victory in the name of the. Lord,” Chance, real name Chancelor Bennett, told the Sun-Times after the verdict was announced at the Daley Center.
Jurors also ruled in Bennett’s countersuit, which was combined with Corcoran’s lawsuit for purposes of the trial. When the suit was filed, Chance originally had sought $1 million in damages. Jurors decided Corcoran must pay Bennett $35, and recommended that Corcoran turn over the internet domain name ChanceRaps (dot com), which Corcoran used to sell Chance the Rapper merchandise.
Corcoran’s team argued it was a split decision, with no substantial damages awarded to either side.
“We respect the jury’s decision, but the message to music managers is clear: Get it in writing,” said Jay Scharkey, one of Corcoran’s attorneys. “The jury award of $35 speaks to how seriously the jury viewed Chance’s case.”
Jurors deliberated about two hours before reaching their verdict.
Corcoran declined to comment to the Sun-Times. He had claimed he and the rapper had a “sunset clause” entitling him to three years of earnings after he was terminated in April 2020 amid the fallout from Bennett’s critically panned album “The Big Day.”
During the trial, jurors also heard details of Bennett’s 2021 countersuit accusing Corcoran of breach of duty.
Over their eight-year working relationship from 2012 to 2020, Bennett and Corcoran had been the music industry model for a successful independent artist-manager partnership without record label interference.
But as both parties rested their cases earlier Friday, a different narrative emerged before the packed courtroom.
Corcoran’s legal team described a hardworking manager who deserved to be paid for contributing to the ascent of the Grammy-winning rapper while Bennett’s attorneys tried to portray Corcoran as an opportunistic former employee who was fired for a reason and isn’t owed anything.
“You’ll hear this is a case about greed and people trying to glom onto someone famous and take from them. But that’s not what this story is. It’s about when someone becomes famous and forgets what it took to get him there,” stated Robert Sweeney, lead attorney for Corcoran.
“Chance wanted to be famous and Pat wanted to help,” Sweeney added. “Pat believed in the mission and Pat was going to do whatever it took to make Chance famous.”
In his closing, Sweeney emphasized his client and Bennett had an agreement entitling Corcoran to 15% of net profits for any of the rapper’s projects he worked on, no matter when the money actually came in – even if that was after Corcoran was fired. Based on that agreement, he asserted Corcoran was entitled not only to the sunset clause revenue, but also to “prior to termination” royalties as well as one-time fees for negotiations he conducted with Live Nation for a now-canceled 2019-2020 tour, a Ben & Jerry’s brand partnership and the 2019 Netflix rap competition series “Rhythm & Flow.”
“It doesn’t matter when money comes in, it matters if you worked on it,” Sweeney told jurors. “If you worked on it, you get paid. Mr. Corcoran is here because he wants to get paid.”
Bennett’s legal team fought those assertions, arguing that Bennett and Corcoran never had a written contract. The two former partners famously worked on a 2013 handshake deal and verbal agreement — one Bennett’s team claimed was never questioned until Corcoran was fired.
“There’s not one single document in the seven years they worked together that shows any evidence of a sunset,” stated Bennett’s lead attorney, Precious Jacobs-Perry. Instead, Corcoran’s legal team had relied on “unfounded personal attacks” that tried to paint Bennett as someone “a flake and lazy” while making “The Big Day.”
Jacobs-Perry also alleged Corcoran was overpaid by $312,300 before his termination.
“Pat’s case is really about Pat’s greed trying to take something that he does not deserve and that was never agreed to. … Pat has been fully compensated and is entitled to nothing more.”
Bennett’s attorneys focused on the reasons he countersued, alleging Corcoran mishandled several business deals with merchandise companies and was trying to collect kickbacks to benefit his separate management company, Haight Brand.
“Chance sued Pat on principle after learning about the things Pat was doing behind his back,” said Jacobs-Perry. “Chance decided to stand up for himself and artists everywhere. He made a choice early in his career to be independent, to own his own music and be free from labels and third parties … and it defined everything that followed.” S: Chicago Sun-Times
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