The court decision that granted JAY-Z a win in a copyright suit against Baligh Hamdy’s nephew, Osama Ahmed Fahmy, over the sample used in 2000’s “Big Pimpin” has been officially preserved in court.
According to court documents, Fahmy originally tried to sue on the premise “that Egyptian law recognizes an unalienable moral right of the author to object to offensive uses of a copyrighted work.” It was decided that Egyptian law was not enforceable in the United States and that “Fahmy had not complied with the compensation requirement of Egyptian law, which did not provide for his requested money damages, and which provided for only injunctive relief from an Egyptian court.”
The battle over the “Big Pimpin” sample is a storied one that can be traced all the way back to 1968 when Baligh Hamdy transferred certain license and distribution rights to Egyptian Recording company Sout el Phan. Following his death, Sout el Phan transferred exclusive rights to parts of it catalog to EMI this included Hamdy’s “Khasara” track sampled in “Big Pimpin.”
In 2000, producer Timbaland was forced to come out of pocket $100,000 in a settlement with EMI after he failed to obtain the proper permissions to use the sample. Soon after, Fahmy, heir to his uncle’s estate would come in the picture with a complaint of his own.
He finally filed his lawsuit in 2007 and the case went on trial in 2015 with JAY-Z winning the case the same year. Following Fahmy’s most recent appeal of the decision 9th Circuit Judge Carlos Bea was at the helm of a panel that affirmed the original decision.
