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Llos Angeles Times _COMPANY TOWN THE BIZ / CHUCK PHILIPS and ALAN ABRAHAMSON Rapper Leaves Tangled ., Financial, Legal Legacy Slain rap star Tupac Shakur sold more than $60 million worth of albums this year atone, making him one of the top-selling domestic artists. Yet, at the time of his death, the rapper owed his record company $4.9 million, Shakur’s attorney says. Shakur’s mother—who last week won a court battle forcing Death Row Records and two other companies to stop selling unauthorized Tupac merchandise—be- lieves Death Row shortchanged her son out of royalty payments and has hired an auditor to conduct an independent ac- counting of the rap label's books. The allegations stem from an unusual handwritten three-page contract drafted and signed while Shakur was in prison in 1995. ALL INFORMAT“ON * CONTAINED The dispute illustrates how recording artists’ contracts are skewed in favor of record companies. Even if Shakur had recorded additional albums, he would likely have remained in debt for years to come, sources said. “Tupac was-one of the most successful artists in the music business-/and yet somehow, on the day he died, he had absolutely nothing to show or it,” said ments from Tupac many of the adv contract.” promised under his - Please see THE BIZ, D7 SERED bo BY OSIRIA QWACT QUSOlo 4 AH pole A 1LAWYZ#Q Abiylok Arisa VubA-hA- QOIKOL- KH SEARCHED INDEXED 2-1 SERIALIZED 220 FILED __ ah oe