Kanye West continues to occupy the news not because of the music he’s churning out, but what’s going on his personal life or across the legal landscape. For example, last November, he and Kim Kardashian finally settled their divorce, but in early April, a lawsuit against him surfaced that claimed he banned forks, jewelry and second floor classes at the Donda Academy, as well as spent $10,000 a week on sushi. Now, as we kick off May, word’s come in that West, a.k.a. Ye, is suing his ex-business partner, and this is happening at the same time as Adidas shareholders are suing the sportswear company over issues related to the rapper.
Kanye West Is Suing Ex-Business Partner Thomas St. John Over Their Financial Deal
For those who haven’t been following along, this ex-business partner, named Thomas St. John, sued Kanye West for $4.5 million over the rapper allegedly not following through on a financial deal between them. St. John was hired to be his senior financial officer for 18 months and was to be paid a $300,000 monthly retainer, but he claims that after receiving the first three payments, West told him that their deal was “bullshit” and stated he didn’t want to work with St. John anymore. As reported by TMZ, West has filed a countersuit claiming that their deal isn’t enforceable because he signed it without a lawyer present and while he was "sleep-deprived, stressed, anxious, and under duress."
As detailed in this countersuit, Kanye West and Thomas St. John met each other in March 2022 during one of the former’s “social media meltdowns,” as the article puts it, and the latter came in to help out. They then worked out the $300,000 a month arrangement, and West signed a document in May 2022, but this came at a time when West says he was dealing with both the stress of his divorce from Kim Kardashian and increased paparazzi encounters, leading to him signing said document with consulting with his counsel. The rapper is also taking issue with a clause stating that St. John couldn’t be fired for at least 18 months, so he now not only wants a judge to put the kibosh on this contract, but also have St. John pay him back the $900,000 he’s already been given.
Adidas’ Shareholders Are Suing The Company Over How It Handled Kanye West
In the midst of this legal saga, NBC News shared that Adidas shareholders filed their own lawsuit against the company last Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon, as Portland is where the company’s North American headquarters are located. In case you need a refresher, Adidas dropped its business partnership with West last fall after he made anti-Semitic comments, and this led to the company losing an insane amount of money.
This shareholder lawsuit alleges that Kasper Rorsted, Adidas' former chief executive officer, and Harm Ohlmeyer, either "intended to deceive" investors or "acted with reckless disregard for the truth" regarding the issues the company was having with Kanye West. Although West initially had a "positive impact on the Company" by 2019 through his line of Yeezy trainers, this was also around the time he was making numerous controversial comments, and the lawsuit mentions that an annual report for Adidas’ results in 2018 “ignored serious issues affecting the Partnership.” It’s also alleged that Adidas ignored the risks of having an oversupply of the Yeezy shoes should something have led to the partnership ending “and in particular, if demand for the shoes were to fall due to any controversy surrounding West.”
So between Kanye West countersuing his ex-business partner and Adidas being sued by shareholders over its perceived failure to properly respond to the controversies surrounding the rapper, things continue to remain busy when it comes to him being involved with legal matters. Should there be any major updates regarding either of these lawsuits, we’ll pass them along.
