P.Diddy’s Random Lawsuit

Random House is suing Sean “P. Diddy” Combs for not repaying a $300,000 advance for an autobiography that was never written.

In the lawsuit, filed February 14th in New York State Supreme Court, the publisher alleges Combs and his Bad Boy corporation have “simply kept the money they never rightfully earned.”

“Random House has seldom resorted to a legal course of action with its prospective authors who don’t write the books we have contracted for, but Mr. Sean Combs has left us no choice,” the publisher said in a statement.

The lawsuit says Combs signed an agreement with the Ballantine imprint in 1998 and agreed to complete and deliver his memoir by 1999. The book never materialized, so Random House wants its money back plus interest.

The hip-hop mogul’s publicist, Rob Shuter, called the situation a “disagreement” between the two parties that he hopes will be resolved quickly without litigation.

The situation apparently started going downhill when Combs arranged on his own to collaborate with Mikal Gilmore, a Rolling Stone contributing editor, and paid him $325,000 to do the job.

When the deadline came and went, Random House notified the entrepreneur that he was in breach of contract and needed to return the money.

Combs, in turn, sued Gilmore in 2001 for reneging on the deal.

However, the case was suspended when Gilmore filed for bankruptcy that year and it was then dismissed in 2004.