T.I. & Tiny’s Lawsuit Against Toymaker Accused Of Stealing Image & Likeness Of OMG Girlz Ends In Defeat, Jury Reportedly Took Less Than Two Hours To Deliberate

T.I., Tiny, OMG Girls

T.I. & Tiny’s Lawsuit Against Toymaker Accused Of Stealing Image & Likeness Of OMG Girlz Ends In Defeat, Jury Reportedly Took Less Than Two Hours To Deliberate

Musical couple T.I. and Tiny put up a hard fight on behalf of the girl group OMG Girlz.

After T.I., real name Clifford Harris, and his wife Tameka ‘Tiny’ Harris sued toymakers MGA Entertainment for allegedly stealing the image and likeness of the girl band founded Tiny, a jury reportedly made quickly decided the toymakers were not guilty of any legal wrongdoing.

Reportedly, Tiny initiated the lawsuit after MGA debuted their OMG Dolls collection back in 2019. The Xscape songstress slammed the company for blatantly stealing the likeness of the young singers. Initially, Tiny along with her daughter Zonnique Pullins, who made up 1/3 of the band, took their discrepancies to social media. The mother daughter duo posted several images of the OMG Girlz looks throughout the years, juxtaposed to their eerily similar doll replicas.

In the suit, extreme similarities between the dolls clothes, personas and names, relative to the singing group, was highlighted as infringement violations. The group, established back in 2009 – a decade prior to the release of the OMG Dolls, also included singers Bahja Rodriguez and Breaunna Womack.

OMG Girlz

Back in January, the case first made its way to trial and ended in a mistrial. A court judge reportedly made the decision after hearing T.I. & Tiny’s defense, which included accusations of the toy company being racist and “culturally appropriating” the Black culture. It’s reported the arguments were made despite the judge’s warning not to.

Reportedly, the musical couple was seeking $100 million in damages which they ultimately lost out on. The report notes that the jury only took two hours to deliberate. A final ruling was given in favor of the toy company, with the jury concluding they were not guilty of infringement. MGA’s CEO reportedly spoke out after the verdict was given, calling T.I. & Tiny’s suit a shakedown, stating:

“I’m not happy because I wasted a lot of time, energy — my employees’ time, energy — to deal with an extortion…They knew from the beginning they don’t have a case, and they brought it anyways. And they picked on the wrong guy.” 

Neither T.I. not Tiny have seemed to have spoken publicly about the recent verdict at this time.

[VIA]

Do you think the ruling was fair? Leave your thoughts in the comments below!