RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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A London judge has ordered Amy Winehouse ’s dad to pay over $1 million to two of the late singer’s friends as punishment for “relentlessly” suing them in an “unjustified and unfounded” lawsuit after they auctioned off her memorabilia.
In a ruling Wednesday (July 29) obtained by Billboard , Justice Sarah Clarke ruled Mitch Winehouse must pay £963,851 ($1.3 million) to Naomi Parry and Catriona Gourlay after they beat his “baseless” and “sloppy” case, in which he claimed they didn’t have the right to sell items of her clothing.
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In a scathing decision, the judge called Mitch’s case “speculative, weak, opportunistic and thin” and harshly criticized him for suing the singer’s close friends even though he knew they had the right to sell the items, which Amy had lawfully given to them.
“The defendants had consistently proved themselves to be devoted friends of Amy’s, who stood by her and supported her over many years and were devastated by her death,” the judge wrote. “At no point during all that time, had the defendants ever done anything but behave with honesty, integrity and care for Amy, [Mitch] and his family.”
The judge said that Mitch had pursued Parry and Gourlay “aggressively and relentlessly” in an effort to “intimidate them into giving him what he wanted — which was the proceeds of sale of their items.” His “serious and unfounded allegations” against them “significantly damaged their reputations, career prospects, financial security and health.”
“The fact that he knowingly and deliberately did this to two young women who had stood faithfully by Amy and also by him and his family… makes his unreasonable conduct particularly serious.”
Attorneys for Winehouse, Parry and Gourlay did not immediately return requests for comment.
A decade after Winehouse died from alcohol poisoning at the age of 27, Parry, the star’s longtime stylist, and Gourlay, her friend, moved to auction more than 150 of her former belongings, including clothing, shoes and jewelry.
In a pair of auctions in 2021 and 2023 at Julien’s Auctions in Los Angeles, Parry sold 56 items for $878,000 and Gourlay sold 85 more for $344,000. The auctions included the dress the singer wore at her final concert in Serbia, which went for $243,000.
Mitch, the administrator of this daughter’s estate, sued Naomi Parry and Catriona Gourlay in London’s High Court in 2023, demanding they turn over the proceeds of the auctions. He claimed the items never belonged to them and were the property of the estate.
But in April, following a trial in London, Judge Clarke rejected the entire case. She ruled that Winehouse had either gifted or given the items to her friends, and that Mitch knew this but pursued the case anyway.
In Wednesday’s decision, the judge said Mitch had suffered that “resounding defeat” because his case suffered from obvious “fatal flaws” that he had ignored in his effort to profit from the auctions.
“The claimant unreasonably refused to accept the defendants’ explanations for their legitimate possession of the Disputed Items,” the judge wrote. “The claimant pursued his claim and these serious allegations to the very end and made no concessions, despite the clear and obvious evidence that fatally undermined him.”
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