– Raven has joined Marcus “Buff” Bagwell in his lawsuit against WWE over alleged unpaid royalties in relation to the WWE Network. PWInsider reports that an amended complaint was filed on September 7th in which Scott Levy joined as a plaintiff.
The amended lawsuit has the two claiming that they haven’t received their “contractually owed royalty payments” from WWE and/or WCW for content that was solid or licensed on the WWE Network. The two are filing as a class lawsuit on behalf of others, claiming that the total owed is in the $5 million range. The amended complaint argues that WWE Network should be providing royalties to talent based on their contracts, as the Network has basically replaced DVD sales for the company and since the WWE contracts say royalties include content on “technology yet to be created,” the Network falls under that purview.
In the case of Raven specifically, the complaint notes that he has only been paid royalties on material that is sold on DVD even when it appears on the Network, such as “The True Story of WrestleMania” and the Paul Heyman DVD. The suit claims that WWE grossed $159.4 million from the Network in 2015 and that when Levyt was released from the company, his buyout noted that WWE no longer owed Levy for any obligations with the exception of royalties owed going forward.
Bagwell’s complaint is nearly identical to his initial lawsuit filming on August 9th, though it also notes that WWE and the WWE-owned version of WCW were two separate corporations, although he only received checks and orders from WWE. The complaint states, “The corporate veil of WWE should be pierced because WWE actively and pervasively controlled WCW-WWE and intermingled the activities of the two corporations engaged in the same enterprise, while disregarding the separate nature of the corporate entities.”
Bagwell and Raven have asked for a trial by Jury, and WWE has until October 8th to respond to the amended complaint.
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