Madonna’s lawsuit against a former friend who auctioned off memorabilia she once owned has not ended the way she had hoped. According to The Wrap, a judge shot down Madonna’s lawsuit over the auctioning of several items, including a breakup letter from her former boyfriend, late rapper Tupac Shakur, that he wrote to her while in jail. The judge cited the statute of limitations and a 2004 settlement agreement Madonna entered into as reasons for tossing the lawsuit.
Last year, Madonna filed a lawsuit against art consultant Darlene Lutz and Gotta Have It! Collectibles, claiming the “highly personal items” went missing during a move out of her Miami home in 2004. As reported by Page Six , Madonna claimed she didn’t realize the items were missing until online auctioneer Gotta Have It! Collectibles put a personal letter to her from Tupac, a hairbrush containing her hair, a pair of satin panties, and more personal memorabilia up for auction in July 2017. Madonna was able to block the auction last summer, stopping the sale of the highly personal letter that detailed Tupac’s reasons for ending his relationship with her.
But Manhattan Supreme Court Judge Gerald Lebovits revealed that the music superstar only had three years under state law to recover the missing items. The short statute of limitations and a 2004 settlement Lutz paid Madonna over an artwork dispute did the singer’s case in. The settlement released Madonna’s former friend from “any and all” future claims, the judge announced.
Madonna was granted a temporary restraining order to halt the sale of a love letter Tupac Shakur sent her from jail https://t.co/qWfIYGDPCJ pic.twitter.com/xnCRHQd13q
— CNN (@CNN) July 20, 2017
Madonna’s relationship with Tupac Shakur was not a secret but wasn’t heavily publicized to the public. On an episode of The View , former host Rosie Perez once revealed that she actually set Madonna up with the rapper. Perez revealed that after she was stood up by her date at the 1993 Soul Train Awards, Shakur offered to be her date for the ceremony. But it was her good friend Madonna who expressed an interest in him, and when Perez told Shakur the singing superstar wanted to meet him, the rapper reportedly told her to “hook that up.”
In the 2007 Madonna: Like an Icon, it was revealed that Madonna and Tupac briefly dated one year before the rapper’s death, reports E! . Tupac Shakur was shot and killed on September 7, 1996, in Las Vegas. The following month Madonna gave birth to her first child, Lourdes, who was fathered by her then-boyfriend, Carlos Leon.
Check out the video below for more on Madonna’s letter from ex-boyfriend Tupac Shakur.