Universal Music Publishing hit with drug related lawsuit

Universal Music Publishing Group today find themselves the subject of an embarrassing lawsuit claiming that that their Santa Monica offices have been infiltrated with “pervasive drug use” and sexual activity leading to a hostile working environment.

What goes on in your offices after hours? Last time we heard from Universal Music Group, it was about them merging two offshoot labels, and launching a British imprint of Capitol Records. But according to a lawsuit filed by an anonymous security guard at the Universal office in disrepute, they’ve since succumbed, quite literally, to sex, drugs, and rock ‘n’ roll.

The security guard in question claims that the management “turned a blind eye” to a series of high profile artists and celebrities coming to the building with drugs in hand, offering her a share, and continuing to use drug paraphernalia. These allegedly included Macy Gray, guests of Jamie Foxx, and Interscope/Geffen’s Jimmy Iovine, who was escorted to a special “lounge”. It states that “You could smell marijuana seeping from various offices and openly used in common areas”.

Some more choice quotes from the lawsuit include:

- When complaining about a smell of marijuana in the studio, she was told:

It’s Adam Levine. You know, from Maroon 5. He can do whatever he wants. If he wants to come to the lobby and do a line of cocaine on the floor, it’s OK.

UMPG employees were complaining about finding bras hanging in the studio and people being found passed out in the showers after partying and drug use.

found condoms plastered in the men’s bathroom while on patrol. She began witnessing UMPG employees engaged in intimate touching and grinding, involving buttocks and genitalia.

The security guard also claims to have been subjected to racial slurs from artists and described her workplace as “sexually charged”. Sounds like that’s barely the tip of the iceberg.

A spokesperson for Universal Music has responded with the following statement:

While we cannot comment on the allegations between the plaintiff and her employer, we can say that the allegations as they relate to Universal Music Group are absurd.