Damon Dash Hit With $7 Million Defamation Suit Over Social Media Remarks

Roc-a-Fella co-founder Damon Dash is seeing some blowback from his social media output, particularly with regards to a film called Dear Frank, itself the subject of considerable legal controversy. Dash was sued earlier this year by filmmaker Josh Webber and his production company, Muddy Water Pictures, for taking credit for directing the movie, which Webber says he was actually fired from early on. Now, The Blast reports that Webber has filed another suit, this one for defamation of character, seeking $7 million (a figure that was reached in part by counting up Dash's social media followers) in damages.

This is a textbook "he said/he said" situation between Dash and Webber, with each seeming to claim responsibility for and ownership of the unreleased movie Dear Frank, previously known as The List. In a post on Instagram that has since been deleted (presumably in response to Webber's suit), Dash summed up his side of the story like this:

"I was going to deal with this later but I guess I'll have to deal with it now…this is the movie the list #thelist that I directed and produced about a year ago… @muddfilms is pretending he owns this film and @joshawebber (pure culture vulture) is pretending he directed this movie…"I'm letting you know now we will be legally dealing with this and any one that touches this film before this is handled will be exposed legally as well… and I know @officialcshort @claudiajordan @brianjwhite @torreihart would never ever check for anything but the truth and only the truth cause it looks like you all are gonna have to tell it… #staytuned."

Bruno Vincent/Getty Images

Webber, on the other hand, says that Dash was only hired as a celebrity name to direct the movie and knew little about the fundamentals of film-making, only to be fired from the job after getting into an argument with an executive producer. His Instagram post is still available to be read:

 

View this post on Instagram

 

I wasn't gonna speak on this bum but fuck him and his lies.. I won't sit back and let this guy try to slander or bully me any longer. Truth is @duskopoppington is not a true independent artist or business man like he tries to pretend to be.. He was HIRED by @muddfilms to "Direct" the film #thelist originally as a "celebrity" Director. I was the producer of the film and asked to ensure that it actually got made by ghost directing certain aspects. Dame has no idea what directing a movie actually is or takes and was constantly yelling at crew members/cast, berating people on set, smoking weed and basically sleeping at the wheel. 🤒 Then while in the process of finishing the film, Dame was being a hot head with the studio executive producer/financier stepping out of line and finally got FIRED!! 🤡 ⌛️ I was approached to finish the job by directing the movie to completion and attached my company to help in its formal release. Really simple to understand. Everyone involved knows the truth especially our core cast @brianjwhite @claudiajordan @officialcshort #honorablepeoplesticktogether. This happened a long time ago already. He just mad because we about to put it out finally and had him cut out the movie entirely like the sucker he is. Dame is only sour because he put himself in a position to lose like he has done so many times in previous business's. 🎙 He is only mad at himself for being an idiot and looking for someone to blame so he screams "Culture Vulture" Grow up! Don't try and make this a race thing! #keepitmovingdummy #nobodycares #youmadbro @funkflex said it best #damedashisaliar and is the true #culturevulture, look up his history.. 👊🏼 @xxl @bet @vanlathan @tmz @entertainmenttonight @enews #damedash #ceobeef

A post shared by Josh Webber (@joshawebber) on Jan 18, 2019 at 9:31pm PST

In the suit, Webber says that Dash's comments on Instagram cost him a $6 million investment opportunity, which is a big part of his claim to $7 million in damages. To put it mildly, it's a huge mess, with two pending lawsuits and possibly more to come, and it will probably be a while before it all gets straightened out.