Robbie Williams and dozens of other pop stars have been left £700,000 out of pocket after funds allegedly went missing from a royalty payment company.
Blur, Travis and Tom Jones were also affected by the incident involving the Association of United Recording Artists which issues payment for radio airplay.

The London-based firm said it dismissed director Peter Horrey after discovering "significant financial irregularities".

A High Court injunction has been obtained freezing Mr Horrey's assets.

The company's chairman, Stephen King, said at least £700,000 had been "misappropriated".

Irregularities

He said Mr Horrey had not contested the High Court injunction. Mr Horrey, from Stansted, Essex, was unavailable for comment.

The irregularities were discovered in an audit taken earlier this year, the company said.

"We do not yet have a final figure for the money that has gone missing," said Mr King. "We have called in specialist auditors to search through our accounts back to 1999, but £700,000 is our estimate so far.

"We have written to all our members informing them of the situation and they have been supportive of us. We are taking action to recover the money."

The Association of United Recording Artists (Aura) is responsible for collecting and distributing £2 million a year in royalties to recording artists and producers.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3793187.stm

Stephen King the writer? If so, I am SURE he will work to get the money to the artists. He may or may not be 100 percent on our side about copyrights, but I am fairly sure he don't want to screw over the artists.

Shmoo, of Electric Gypsy
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yep, the lawsuits are working. The artists are finally getting paid what the labels want to give them.

Somehow I don't think it is Stephen King the author, SK lives in Bangor Maine and probably wouldnt be the chairman of a UK company.

Yeah, would be a little stange if it were him...

Yeah, when this came out, the UK Stephen King was probably like "Damn, now everyone will think I wrote 'Needful Things'."

And when the US Stephen King hears of this he'll probably be like "What, there's another me out there?" and write a book about Doppelgangers or something.

Still, one must wonder exactly what the accountant did with all that money.

The diversion of royalty funds to help pay for the lawsuits.....is what comes to mind here.....Next they will tell the artists we are doing this for you....

WHY NOT everybody else is screwing the artists No wonder INDIE MUSIC is the wave of the FUTURE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Is this the same royalties company that pays American artists? I'd hate to think that first the artists are screwed by the recording companies and then screwed again by the royalty company, all approved by the government who handed exclusive control of royalty payments to just one company.

Boy would that suck. Oh, wait...