Months after a man unsuccessfully sued Cardi B after his back tattoo was photoshopped onto her Gangsta B**ch Music Vol. 1 mixtape cover, he has agreed to repay the rapper $350,000 for the legal expenses she spent to defeat his lawsuit.
According to Billboard, Kevin Brophy’s lawyers told a federal judge Monday (June 12) that he would not only reimburse the money that the Bronx rapper had spent on her attorneys but also voluntarily end his efforts to revive the case and waive any chance at a future appeal. “The parties now have reached an agreement avoiding the necessity of defendants’ motion for attorney’s fees and application to tax costs,” the two sides wrote in the filing.
In 2017, Brophy sued Cardi in 2017 for millions, claiming he was “devastated, humiliated and embarrassed” by the cover of Cardi B’s mixtape. The image featured the then-rising star drinking from a beer bottle while staring directly into the camera with her legs spread wide and holding a man’s head while he appears to perform oral sex on her.
The man on the cover was a model who consented to the photoshoot, but a giant tattoo on his back belonged to Brophy. Apparently the “UP” rapper didn’t know that her freelance graphic designer had typed “back tattoos” into Google Image Search and edited onto the model’s body.
According to Billboard, Brophy’s lawsuit claimed that Cardi B and others involved in the cover had used his likeness without his consent and also violated his right to privacy by casting him in a “false light” that was “highly offensive.” Cardi’s lawyers called the allegations “sheer fantasy” and “vastly overblown.”