Photo Credit: RZA for BRealTV (Instagram)
Martin Shkreli has filed a detailed counterclaim against producer RZA (aka Robert Diggs) over the Wu-Tang Clan’s single-copy album, which Shkreli still claims to own despite a court-ordered forfeiture.
Disgraced “pharma bro” Martin Shkreli has filed a detailed counterclaim against RZA, alleging he still retains ownership of half of the Wu-Tang Clan’s single-copy album, Once Upon a Time in Shaolin, despite a court-ordered forfeiture. In the federal filing, shared exclusively with Digital Music News this week, Shkreli claims the half of the copyrights he doesn’t own is purportedly due to him 88 years after he purchased the album in 2015.
Despite federal officials having seized the album and sold it in a 2021 auction to pay victims of Shkreli’s 2017 securities fraud conviction, Shkreli still claims over the 35-page legal document that he retains some of the rights. The 2021 auction saw digital art collective PleasrDAO acquire the album for $4 million.
According to Shkreli, he paid $1.5 million for the only existing physical copy of the Wu-Tang Clan’s much-anticipated 2015 album through a bespoke arrangement with RZA and Wu-Tang producer Cilvaringz. He alleges this arrangement was “bifurcated” into tangible and intangible deliverables.
The former, he says, included the two-disc set in an engraved nickel-silver box, a certificate of authenticity, and a leather-bound manuscript. The latter included the alleged immediate grant of 50% ownership of the album’s copyrights and the promise to transfer the remaining half in 2103, according to Shkreli.
The lawsuit comes after PleasrDAO sued Shkreli in June 2024, alleging he retained digital copies of the album after the court ordered its forfeiture. Last month, a federal judge ruled that PleasrDAO’s case could move to trial, determining that the album could qualify as an unlawfully retained trade secret. Shkreli’s new filing refutes this determination.
“Mr. Shkreli’s approach throughout this throughout this case has been to distract and delay, with actions that the court has consistently and strongly rejected,” said Steven Cooper, the lead attorney for PleasrDAO. “These counterclaims will meet the same fate. They are untimely, non-cognizable, and oddly claim that Mr. Shkreli retained rights to the album when he was under a court order to forfeit all of his rights in his criminal prosecution.”
Previously, RZA admitted that he had regrets over selling the album and sometimes fantasized about buying it back.
“It was hard for me to sell that album because I wanted it to be on my living room table,” he told Rolling Stone. “When it was finally completed, and everything was sent out, I was like, ‘This would be great in the Wu mansion.’ […] I argued with the people that invested money to get the project on its way, but they wanted [their investment] back. So, it would’ve cost me more than the selling price in reality, because of the deficit that was already incurred.”
