Court told Michael Jackson Estate to pay Tohme Tohme’s settlement pay out

July 17, 2020

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The lawsuit started in 2012 where Tohme Tohme claimed he was owned 15% of Michael Jackson profits on the last year of his life for managing the super star and a cut of “This Is It” movie which he has no involvement in.

Last year, the Estate and Tohme came to an arrangement and settled a fee out of court.

However, according to a court documents, which was improperly redacted, Tohme will received $3 million as part of the settlement. The estate hasn’t paid, but it argued that’s because they never executed their agreement in writing and the deal required a mutual release.

Tohme in November sued John Branca and John McClain, as representatives of the estate, for breach of contract in an attempt to get the court to force them to pay up. He claims the draft of the agreement the estate sent him included terms he hadn’t agreed to and it was never signed, but that doesn’t matter because they made an oral agreement.

L.A. County Superior Court judge Mark A. Young on Tuesday granted Tohme’s motion. He found that the parties had formed an oral agreement and the evidence presented by Tohme suggests the estate, in refusing to pay, didn’t keep up its end of the deal.

“Here, the parties orally agreed to all of the terms and conditions of a settlement agreement,” finds Young, noting specifically that their oral agreement included a mutual general release of claims. “Defendant fails to produce any evidence that parties intended for there to be a binding contract after a writing was produced, such that there exists a material issue of dispute fact.”

Although it’s Tohme who prevailed on the motion, the decision isn’t a really loss for the estate as the court found the oral agreement regarding the mutual release to be binding as well. So Tohme will get his $3 million and the estate will get the assurance that they won’t be engaged in anymore litigation with him.