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Fyre Festival Lawsuit: Mark Geragos Files $100 Million Suit Against Ja Rule, Billy McFarland

By Shaunee Flowers
Published on: 05:33 PST, May 1, 2017

Those who showed up for the highly hyped-up Fyre Festival in the Bahamas last week described the setup as the Hunger Games edition of Coachella. Now, Fyre Festival organizers Ja Rule and Billy McFarland are being sued to the tune of $100 million for fraud, and the man behind the huge lawsuit is none other than famous entertainment attorney Mark Geragos.

At this point, there’s no argument that the Fyre Festival was a total flop. Some concertgoers paid upwards of $12,000 to attend the now-defunct first-ever Fyre Festival in the Bahamas. It was billed as a ritzy version of Coachella but with headliners like Blink 182 and Tyga. The failed festival also claimed that those who purchased certain VIP tickets would be fed chef-catered meals and would sleep in luxury during their stay.

The biggest complaints about the Fyre Festival were that the promised headliners weren’t even there. The food was not even nearly what was promised as guests were fed dry cheese sandwiches and salads with no dressing served from styrofoam containers.

There were also complaints about security at the Fyre Festival, or specifically the lack of security. The accommodations also were highly criticized. The PVC pipe tents with beds inside that were strewn about the festival grounds were referred to as “FEMA relief tents” and didn’t even closely resemble a safe place to rest between sets.

After the Fyre Festival was clearly a fail, one concertgoer lawyered up, and his high-powered attorney might spell the permanent end to a future revival of the failed music festival. Mark Geragos, who has defended such high-powered clients as Michael Jackson and Chris Brown, is now defending Fyre Festival attendee Daniel Jung who forked over $2,000 to attend the music festival over the weekend.

On Sunday, Ben Meisalas of Geragos & Geragos law firm tweeted out news that their firm will be filing suit against the Fyre Festival to the tune of $100 million. Meisalas tweeted out a copy of the lawsuit paperwork that was filed and claimed that no one who dared to attend the nightmare Fyre Festival deserves much more than a refund. Especially when many who were at the Bahamas’ music festival feared for their safety and were forced to seek shelter and their own way off the island.

The lawsuit is asking for such a huge amount of money, claiming that Ja Rule and Billy McFarland were aware ahead of time that the Fyre Festival was going to be a total disaster and did nothing to prevent it or warn guests about it. Further, it claims that Fyre Festival promoters did warn their own employees and celebrities not to attend due to the lack of security and other issues that they were facing.

Although the lawsuit was started with Daniel Jung, it has been called a “federal class action” and will cover whatever Fyre Festival attendees want to join. A full statement regarding the Fyre Festival lawsuit was issued.

In response to the huge Fyre Festival fail, one of the celebrities who had been paid to promote it already distanced herself. Kendall Jenner was posting all about the Fyre Festival in the Bahamas prior to the chaos. After learning that the brand new festival was a total nightmare, Kendall erased all traces of her Fyre Festival support from Instagram. It looks like she’ll be dealing with the Fyre Festival fallout in the same way she dealt with the bad press from her Pepsi commercial — she completely ignored it.

It wasn’t until Ja Rule tweeted that all guests of the Fyre Festival were safe and that they could apply for a refund that the Mark Geragos-backed lawsuit was filed. Ja Rule apologized profusely on social media, claiming that the Fyre Festival was a passion project and that it didn’t even meet his most basic expectations. He also repeatedly has said that the failure of the Bahamas-based music festival was not his fault.

Billy McFarland also failed to take ownership of the Fyre Festival failures, according to Rolling Stone. Instead, he claimed that a surprise storm was to blame for the chaos that ensued. He also said that this won’t be the last Fyre Festival and that next year they will start planning earlier.

[Featured Image by Nicholas Hunt/Getty Images]

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