Being sued to pay a huge amount of 30 million dollars in legal fine, 30 Seconds to Mars' frontman Jared Leto fights back, claiming that the fine is over sized.
- Aug 19, 2008
AceShowbiz - 30 Seconds to Mars' frontman Jared Leto has just shared his thought about $30-millions lawsuit that Virgin/EMI Records have filed against his band. He wrote in the group's official website that the lawsuit doesn't make any sense at all because the contract that he and his band mates have allegedly breached, is actually out of date.
Furthermore, Jared wrote that in California where they live and signed the deal, the law limits contract length for maximum seven years, and based on that, he said that their 1999 agreement is null and void because it supposed to have ended in 2006. However, Virgin are said to have ignored the law and instead of renewing it, they tried to make it outside the California law. "We had been signed to our record contract for 9 years. Basically, under California law, where we live and signed our deal, one cannot be bound to a contract for more than 7 years. This is widely known by all the record companies and has been for years. In fact, so aware of it are they that they desperately try to make deals outside of California whenever possible," he wrote.
Commenting on the number of legal fine that the Virgin are seeking, Jared said that $30 millions dollars is just an insane and over sized fine. "You may have heard we are being sued by our former record company for the ridiculously over sized, totally unrealistic and pretty silly (but slightly clever) sum of $30,000,000. Insane? Yea that's what we said too," he wrote. He also said that with their latest record entitled "A Beautiful Lie" that has been sold over 2 million copies worldwide since August 2005, the label should have been able to earn profits. Other things in the lawsuit that made Jared and his band mates mad at, is the fact that their next record is asked to be used to pay off the supposed debt.
EMI's spokesperson responded to Jared's statement by saying, "We have been forced to take procedural, legal steps in order to protect EMI's investment and rights during contract renegotiations initiated by the band and management. We hope to resolve these matters amicably and put them behind us so we can continue working in partnership with the band to take them to even greater levels of success."
Despite the court battle that they will go into, the band are now reportedly working on a new album in Los Angeles. Unfortunately, there is no further confirmation about the album details.
