Drake has been accused in a federal class-action RICO lawsuit of using the online sweepstakes casino Stake.us to boost the play counts of his music across the major streaming platform.
On Wednesday Dec 31, self-proclaimed Stake.us users LaShawnna Ridley and Tiffany Hines submitted the multifaceted RICO complaint to a Virginia federal court. The involved law firm, Impresa Legal Group, today put out a formal release about the case for good measure.
The total defendants include Drake, Adin Ross and George Nguyen, whom are being accused of discreetly transferring money to each other to finance fraudulent music botting campaigns.
The press release states that the trio “worked to use Stake’s Tipping feature to exchange funds to deploy bots, create fraudulent streams of Drake’s music, fabricate popularity, disparage competitors and music label executives and distort recommendation algorithms.”
“At the heart of the scheme, Drake — acting directly and through willing and knowledgeable co-conspirators — has deployed automated bots and streaming farms to artificially inflate play counts of his music across major platforms, such as Spotify,” the lawsuit states.
No one has been charged criminally with regard to the allegations in the lawsuit.
The lawsuit, which also names Stake.us and parent company Sweepstakes Limited as defendants, was filed as Drake (real name Aubrey Drake Graham) has been preparing to release a new album titled “Iceman.”
The lawsuit, per the press release, “points to multiple public transactions between Drake and Ross, where they exchange funds ranging from $10,000 to $100,000. In addition, the complaint illustrates how Drake, Ross and Nguyen have each been paid to promote Stake and have received payments through the platform. These undisclosed transactions are part of the RICO scheme designed to mislead consumers into playing a rigged game.”
Drake reportedly partnered with the sweepstakes casino in 2022 worth at least $100 million a year, per the Financial Times.