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Business News Legal
Blogger adds to the pile of Fyre Festival lawsuits
By Chris Cooke | Published on Tuesday 1 August 2017
Another Fyre Festival lawsuit? Yeah, why not I say. A blogger who documented the whole Fyre Festival debacle, as it unfolded on the island in the Bahamas that was meant to host the supposedly luxurious event, has now sued founders Ja Rule and Billy McFarland for fraud, misrepresentation and breach of contract.
Blogger Seth Crossno posted photos from the Fyre Festival shambles, showing how the event’s actual site compared to the luxury set-up that had been promised. His coverage of the unfolding clusterfuck generated plenty of clicks and numerous media subsequently got his take on the whole event, which was cancelled just as it was opening for business.
Crossno reportedly spent $13,000 on tickets for the festival via a package that promised a private jet would get him to the island. In the end his flight was downgraded to a more run of the mill Boeing 737, but with the promise that his accommodation would be upgraded and he’d have artist passes for the weekend. Needless to say, the accommodation upgrade wasn’t up to much.
According to Amplify, the new lawsuit filed in North Carolina by Crossno and his friend Mark Thompson states: “When [they] arrived to the site, they were shocked to find that, instead of the luxury experience that was advertised, they were greeted with a disastrous and barren area where workers were scrambling to set up the most basic infrastructure. [There was] no security in place and minimal amounts of Fyre Festival workers were available to provide direction or information”.
The new lawsuit is seeking $25,000 in damages, accusing Ja Rule, McFarland and the festival’s marketing chief Grant Margolin of the fraud, misrep and contract breach. The new litigation, of course, lands on a pile of other lawsuits filed against the Fyre companies and their founders by angry ticket-holders, suppliers and financial backers. McFarland also faces criminal charges for alleged fraud.
Though given McFarland is being repped by a public defender in the criminal case and is self-defending in at least one of the civil lawsuits after being unable to pay his lawyer’s fees, it’s not clear if there is any money left for all these litigants to claim. Until McFarland et al sell the movie rights to the whole Fyre shit storm. I’d probably pay to see that film.
