Punitive damages trial begins in T.I. and Tiny Harris' lawsuit against MGA over OMG Girlz
Also, four men in Florida were sentenced to life in prison on Monday for murdering a gang member and rapper known for his music videos mocking the deaths of rivals.
A fourth trial began Tuesday in hip-hop moguls Clifford “T.I.” and Tameka “Tiny” Harris’ federal trade dress lawsuit over toymaker MGA Entertainment’s L.O.L. Surprise OMG Dolls.
The four women and four men seated for the jury in Santa Ana, California, are to decide the amount of punitive damages, if any, that MGA should pay for infringing the trade dress and misappropriating the likeness of Tiny’s daughter’s music group, the OMG Girlz. The jury knows that a previous jury in September 2024 said MGA is liable and owes $17.8 million, and the judge told them on Tuesday that verdict won’t change.
“Your job begins where the prior jury’s job ended,” Senior U.S. District Judge James V. Selna said before opening statements began.
Selna did not tell the jury that the previous jury awarded $53.6 million in punitive damages and he eliminated it because he didn’t believe evidence in trial showed MGA willfully intended to infringe or misappropriate.
MGA is one of the largest toymakers in the world and is based in Chatsworth, near Los Angeles. Its L.O.L. Surprise OMG Dolls were first released in 2019 and are among the most purchased toys in the world.
The OMG Girlz formed in 2009 and began posting videos on social media against in the last couple years. The group consists of Tiny’s daughter Zonnique Pullins, Bahja Rodriguez and Breaunna Womack; all were in court on Tuesday.
CEO Isaac Larian initiated the litigation in December 2020 after he received a cease-and-desist letter. He sought declaratory relief regarding any possible infringement claims from the OMG Girlz. The Harrises then sued in a counterclaim.
The case first went to trial in January 2023, but Judge Selna declared a mistrial after jurors mistakenly heard deposition testimony from a woman who said she stopped buying the OMG dolls because, “I did not want to support a company that steals from African Americans and their ideas.” The judge had ordered attorneys not to mention cultural appropriation and racism claims during trial.
Jurors in the second trial in May 2023 rejected all claims and asked if they could order the Harrises to pay the money MGA’s attorneys charged the company for working the case.
The verdict didn’t stand because of the U.S. Supreme Court ruled after trial that a dog toy modeled off a Jack Daniel’s whiskey bottle doesn’t deserve added protection under the First Amendment. The holding contradicted Judge Selna’s instruction to jurors in the MGA trial that the company’s dolls are an expressive work worthy of First Amendment protection, so he ordered a new trial.
The third trial ended on Sept. 23, 2024, with jurors concluding that 14 of the OMG dolls misappropriate the likeness and infringe the trade dress of the OMG Girlz. The eight jurors found one doll misappropriates the likeness, but they concluded it does not infringe the trade dress. They also concluded another 17 dolls do neither.
They awarded $17,872,253 in actual damages, which match the profits for seven dolls, and $53,616,759 in punitive damages, which is exactly three times the actual damages award.
Judge Selna, a 2003 George W. Bush appointee in the Central District of California, initially said he wouldn’t adopt the punitive damages award, but he changed his mind and issued the final judgment on April 30 for $71,489,012, with interest compounded annually at 3.972 percent beginning April 15, 2025.
The case didn’t end there, however, because MGA’s lawyers moved for a judgment in the company’s favor or a new trial or remittitur, which is when a judge reduces a jury’s damages award. He declined to vacate the jury’s liability findings against MGA or its initial $17.8 million damages verdict, but he again said no evidence of willful conduct supports the $53.6 million punitive damages award and he eliminated it from the judgment.
9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals Judges Barry G. Silverman and Holly A. Thomas in January rejected a petition for permission to appeal Selna’s order for a new trial, filed by MGA’s lawyers at Umberg Zipser LLP in Irvine, California, and Williams & Connolly LLP in Washington D.C.
The Harrises’ lawyer John Keville, managing partner of Sheppard, Mullin, Richter & Hampton LLP’s Houston office, told jurors in his 40-minute opening statement that the trial “is is not about compensation.”
“This is about punishment and deterring future conduct,” Keville said.
Keville showed photos of MGA dolls resembling Michael Jackson, Elton John, Lady Gaga and Audrey Hepburn and said jurors can’t compensate them for what MGA did to others, but one factor for punitive damages is “did they have a pattern of practice of copying?”
He played a clip of Larian testifying in a deposition, “Your OMG band are nowhere. Trust me. Nowhere.”
“That’s what he had to say about these young ladies, even though he never looked at their letter. He never tried to figure out, ‘Hey, what have they done?’ He said, ‘Trust me. They’re nowhere.’ And the insults were a common thing throughout the case,” Keville said.
He said jurors will “see in this trial that Mr. Larian had a pattern of not answering questions.”
Keville also said he’s seen “reports” that say MGA’s “net revenue is over $4 billion, and Mr. Larian has a personal net worth reported of $1.8 billion.”
“In the end we’re going to ask you to award a very substantial punitive damages amount sufficient to deter the billionaire — Mr. Larian — and his multibillion dollar company in MGA from what we expect the evidence will show: malicious, oppressive, and fraudulent conduct,” Keville said.
MGA’s lawyer Chad Hummel, a principal in McKool Smith’s Los Angeles office, later asked Judge Selna to strike the comment and specially instruct the jury that the company’s revenue isn’t relevant to punitive damages. He did so.
“Revenues are not relevant. It’s net profit that’s relevant. I’ll clarify this in the closing instruction,” Selna told the jury.
Hummel is the third lead trial lawyer for MGA, after Jennifer Keller of Keller Anderle Scolnick LLP in Costa Mesa then Paul Loh of Willenken LLP.
He told jurors in his 35-minute opening statement that MGA did not act maliciously and Larian had never heard of the OMG Girlz before he received their letter in 2020.
“How could he act with malice if he didn’t even hear of them?” Hummel said.
Keville showed jurors an internal company email in which MGA employees including doll designer Blanche Consorti mentioned the OMG Girlz, but Hummel said Consorti only heard of them in that instance and “had already designed the line.”
Larian testified as the first witness on Tuesday afternoon. Judge Selna struck his testimony that no one has heard of the OMG Girlz, including the jury.
Keville questioned Larian about the company selling one of the infringing dolls in 2025, despite attorneys twice telling Judge Selna it was no longer available. Larian said he had “no idea” what the lawyers were doing and wasn’t included.
He will continue testifying on Wednesday. Judge Selna allotted each side eight hours to present their case, so the trial is expected to end on Friday.
Court documents:
Nov. 30, 2025: MGA’s 9th Circuit petition
Dec. 10, 2025: OMG Girlz’ reply to petition
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Four men sentenced to life in prison for murdering Florida rapper Julio Foolio
A judge in Tampa, Florida, on Monday (June 22) sentenced four men to life in prison without parole for the 2024 murder of a rival gang member and rapper.
Judge Michelle Sisco followed the jury’s May 15 recommendation for life in prison instead of death for Sean Gathright, 20; Isaiah Chance, 23; Davion Murphy, 29; and Rashad Murphy, 32, for the June 23, 2024, ambush shooting of Charles “Julio Foolio” Jones, Jr.
Jones was from Jacksonville and was in Tampa celebrating his 26th birthday. He was prominent in drill rap, a subgenre of hip-hop music that celebrates violence and mocks death, and he’d been shot several times before.
A Jacksonville detective testified in trial about other murders and shootings related to a feud involving Jones’ gang. Jones’ music videos featured him pouring champagne on the graves of murder victims, including a rival who was related to the Murphy cousins.
Sisco, who presides in Florida’s 13th Judicial District in Tampa, said the case is “by far the longest case, the most intricate case, the most difficult case that I’ve ever handled in almost 24 years.”
The evidence showed a “trail of dead bodies, just one young man after the next, just cut down in the prime of their lives,” the judge said. “It is shocking, and I just can’t believe that any community, if they’re made aware of it, will stand by and put up with that. I mean, it’s just tragic.”
Jones “did not deserve to die for what he did, or ... the drill rap videos he made, but goodness gracious, going and desecrating the grave site of a murdered relative is, you don’t deserve to be killed for that, but you just increased your odds that it was going to happen, and that's the truth,” the judge said.
“So I’m not at all again stating that he deserved it, but it really, it’s just shocking. It’s shocking to me, and I do have great sympathy for the defendants. You all, for the most part, are young men, and some of you have children. … Now you’re looking at life in prison, and what was it for?” Sisco said.
She said the Murphys “had a difficult childhood.”
“There is no question that the hand that you were dealt from Jump Street was not the best. ... It’s not an excuse, but I do acknowledge it,” Sisco said.
But Chance and Gathright were different, she said.
“The cards that you were dealt were pretty good. They were pretty darn good, better than the average person. So it’s particularly hard. I am heartbroken for you. I’m heartbroken for your family members. I’m heartbroken for your children. I am. So I do have great sympathy. But you have been convicted, and it was a horrible crime that was committed, and there is a price to be paid, and there's just no way around that,” the judge said.
Gathright’s mother said she hopes the publicity of the trial “will change a lot of things in people’s lives and change their minds and opinions.”
Judge Sisco said she’s been “a very devoted mother to your son” who’s “been here throughout the trial.”
“He’s very fortunate to have you as his mother, and I know your heart is broken. I know it is, because it'‘ your child, and I do have sympathy for that. … I hope, as well, for the community’s sake, that there is some change, because this can’t go on. This tragedy just cannot go on,” Sisco said.
Gathright’s referred to the murder as a “tragic event” that “occurred when Sean was barely 18 years old, and this is a time when the prefrontal cortex of the brain is not fully developed.”
“Sean is a bright young man, and given the opportunity, I believe he can make an outstanding role model for younger people. He’s a strong Christian, and he is liked by his peers as well as adults. This one event should not define the rest of his life,” she said.
Gathright told the judge he believes people under the age of 21 should not be sentenced to life in prison without parole.
“It is heartbreaking that an 18 year old can’t rent a car or a hotel or buy a home but can be sentenced to death or life in prison without the possibility of parole. They can’t purchase alcohol or tobacco but can be sentenced to death or life in prison without the possibility of parole. They can’t work certain jobs or even go on a cruise without a chaperone but can be sentenced to death without life, or life … without possibility of parole,” Gathright said.
Gathright said he wants to “see change.”
“Change for those whose fates were sealed long before they were born. Change for the prodigal sons and daughters who ventured off too far in the world and got lost. Change for those who haven’t reached full maturity or unlocked their full potential as adults. Change for the ones who never had the option to go around, over or underneath but straight through their obstacles,” Gathright said.
Chance said he doesn’t think it’s fair that he's getting life in prison while his girlfriend who was with him that night was sentenced to 15 years.
Judge Sisco said “you probably know when Ms. Andrews went to trial, she basically pinned it all on you.”
Chance said everything in trial “is done strategically, so how the lawyers optimize what they’re going to say or what they’re going to do, they do it with the client, you know, I’m not saying what she’s saying was wrong or not wrong.”
He also said he had a message for his hometown of Jacksonville that “it aint worth it, boy.”
“The dissing, the beefing, the shooting. Like, for what? Like, for what?” Chance said. “Like when you’re sitting in your cell alone, cold. It’s lonely as hell in that bit.”
“The only person there for you is your mother, and maybe like one friend, maybe,” he continued.
Davion Murphy said he’ll always “keep a positive mind state and a positive mindset.”
“To God be the glory all the time, and He’ll forever have the last say so in our situation,” Murphy said. “As I said in my interrogation interview, I’ll be judged for it, and I’ll forever retain my innocence.”
Murphy continued, “And I just want to say to the Gen-Z generation change your life and do something productive with your life. Because in this predicament it aint worth it. Like it was said before, this not my first rodeo down this road. It’s looking like forever, but I’ll forever keep a positive mind state and a positive mindset, but to God be the glory forever. That’s it.”
Rashad Murphy said only, “I love, I love everybody.”
Judge Sisco rejected motions for new trial or judgments of acquittal after hearing argument from defense attorneys and prosecutor Michelle Doherty, an assistant state attorney in Hillsborough County.
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