The estate of Tupac Shakur achieved a major milestone last week, winning a five-year battle over the late rapper’s unreleased music.
According to TMZ, the estate — once headed by Tupac’s later mother Afeni Shakur— sued Entertainment One back in 2013. The lawsuit claimed Entertainment One had breached a contract to pay Tupac’s estate royalties worth seven figures for 2007’s Beginnings: The Lost Tapes. The estate also sued for the ownership of the master recordings for all of Tupac’s unreleased music.
Now, a court has ruled Entertainment One must pay over six figures for royalties from the rapper’s posthumous releases. This also means that all the unreleased recordings will go back to the estate.
Although Death Row Records initially had the rights to Tupac’s music, the label sold them to Entertainment One in 2006.
And Afeni Shakur, who died in 2016, presided over her late son’s estate, but the case continued under the other estate trustees.
“My son left many incomplete pieces and even more unfinished ideas,” she said when filing the lawsuit. “Using the blueprints he gave us, I am committed to fulfilling this duty…[We] will find innovative ways to continue to keep his music, his message, and his legacy alive.”
