Miley Cyrus pays $300 Million to Jamaican songwriter

Miley Cyrus and Michael “Flourgon” May

Miley Cyrus has reached a settlement in the $300 million copyright infringement lawsuit that accused the singer of stealing her 2013 hit “We Can’t Stop.”

Cyrus’ lawyers previously revealed a settlement agreement had been made in a December 12th letter that would be filed “pending payment of the settlement proceeds.” Terms of the settlement were not revealed.

Representatives for Cyrus and RCA Records did not respond to Rolling Stone‘s requests for comment.

The lawsuit, filed in 2018, was made by Jamaican songwriter Michael May, who alleged that “We Can’t Stop” replicated his 1988 track “We Run Things.”

May, who performs under the moniker Flourgon, claimed that Cyrus and her label, Sony Corp’s RCA Records, stole material such as the hook “We run things. Things no run we,” which she performed as “We run things. Things don’t run we,” reports Reuters.

Together, May, Cyrus and Sony – along with a production team that includes Mike Will Made It – filed documents in Manhattan federal court to dismiss the lawsuit “with prejudice,” which is a final judgment that stops the plaintiff from filing the lawsuit again.

Cyrus’ partying anthem “We Can’t Stop” was released by RCA Records in June 2013 as the lead single on her fourth studio album Bangerz. In August 2013, the song peaked at Number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100; as Reuters notes, “We Can’t Stop” was blocked from Number One by the now-similarly litigious “Blurred Lines.”

Miley Cyrus and Michael “Flourgon” May