Bernie Worrell's widow sued George Clinton for half of 264 Parliament-Funkadelic recordings, and an appeals court sent the case to trial

Bernie Worrell, P-Funk's Juilliard-trained keyboardist, died of lung cancer in 2016 at 72. In 1976 he signed an agreement giving Clinton's company, Thang, Inc., ownership of his recordings in exchange for royalties. Thang never countersigned it, and a New York court later found it invalid. In 2022 his estate, represented by his widow Judie Worrell, sued Thang and Clinton in Detroit, claiming Worrell co-owned 264 recordings. On 4 September 2025 Judge F. Kay Behm ruled the claims time-barred. On 27 May 2026 the Sixth Circuit reversed in part. Judge Karen Nelson Moore wrote that Clinton, having argued in New York that the contract never applied, must accept that "federal copyright law, not contract law, now controls." Claims to recordings from 1976 to 1978 return for trial; others stay barred. Universal froze 100 percent of Clinton's royalties across at least 12 accounts, citing the Worrell case. On 15 May 2026 Clinton sued UMG in Michigan for more than $1.1 million. Separately, in March 2025 Clinton sued Armen Boladian, Bridgeport Music and Westbound Records in Florida federal court for $100 million, alleging fraud over about 90 percent of his copyrights. Boladian's side called it the latest in a series of unfounded suits. In 2001 a Florida federal judge upheld Bridgeport's 1983 contract. In October 2026 all three cases are pending.