Employment & Labor Insider

Chris Beattie, a founder of and bass player for the metalcore band Hatebreed, is suing over his dismissal from the band. According to his lawsuit, he was kicked out in November 2024 when a security guard at a Live Nation event accused him of harassment.

Hatebreed the band was formed in 1994, and Mr. Beattie didn't have any legal agreements with the other founding members. By 2024, the only original members left in the band were Mr. Beattie and the lead singer, James Shanahan (stage name Jamey Jasta).

Back in 2004, Mr. Shanahan formed Hatebreed Inc. with himself as Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and Secretary. After Mr. Beattie was terminated in 2024, he sued Mr. Shanahan and Hatebreed Inc., saying they used the harassment claim as an excuse to get him out of the way so they could keep all the money for themselves.

Mr. Shanahan allegedly engaged in some shenanigans with the business, and Mr. Beattie has sued over that, too, but I’m going to focus on whether Mr. Beattie has stated valid termination claims against Mr. Shanahan and the corporation.

Because this case is at the earliest stages, Mr. Shanahan and Hatebreed Inc. (and the court) have to assume that Mr. Beattie’s allegations are true. If the court allows the lawsuit to go forward, the defendants will get a chance to give their side of the story.

And, just so you know, I looked everywhere for specifics about the harassment allegations made by the security guard – which Mr. Beattie denies – and came up dry. But Mr. Beattie seems to acknowledge that the complaint was in fact made. (In other words, Mr. Shanahan didn't fabricate it.) Mr. Beattie also acknowledges that Mr. Shanahan told the other band members about the allegation, although he contends that Mr. Shanahan terminated him “unilaterally.”

I hate it for ya, but you may lose.

With respect to his termination, Mr. Beattie is suing for breach of contract based on an "implied partnership," negligent infliction of emotional distress, breach of duty of loyalty, and tortious interference with existing business relationships. Regarding this last claim, Mr. Beattie alleges that he lost some lucrative business relationships with third parties after he was booted from the band.

The defendants have filed a motion to strike some of these claims, and Mr. Beattie has just filed a motion to amend his lawsuit, saying that the amendments should allow the claims to survive. The court hasn't yet decided whether Mr. Beattie will be allowed to file an Amended Complaint, and so the defendants have not yet had a chance to respond to those allegations.

I hate it for Mr. Beattie, but my best guess is that the defendants will win on most, if not all, of the termination-related claims, even as amended. Here’s why.

            Implied partnership

There is indeed something called an “implied partnership” that can result when two or more parties behave as partners, even if they don’t have an express partnership agreement. The courts look at things like whether the “implied partners” assume financial responsibility for the organization’s losses, the level of involvement of the “implied partners” in the direction of the organization, representations made to third parties (for example, Mr. Shanahan says to an event sponsor, “I’m looping in my partner Chris Beattie on this email”), and the like. Mr. Beattie does allege that he incurred some expenses for the greater good of the band, and participated in making some decisions. Based only on his allegations, I can’t tell whether that’s enough for him to be considered an “implied partner.”

But even if he is, I think the fact that there is no contract means there was no contract for a definite term of employment. If I'm right, then I think his status was “at will,” which means that the defendants could terminate him for any reason that was not unlawful.

            Negligent infliction

Generally, even though termination is almost always traumatic for the individual being terminated, the courts routinely find that you can’t assert an emotional distress claim based only on a termination. It could be different where the termination is accompanied by some additional egregious conduct on the part of the employer (for example, literally -- not figuratively -- kicking the employee out the door).

And there are more problems:

• All the bad behavior that Mr. Beattie has alleged on the part of the defendants was intentional, not negligent. You can’t have a negligent infliction claim without some negligence.
• You generally have to allege (and later prove) that you suffered severe emotional distress from the negligent behavior. Mr. Beattie has made some conclusory allegations that he suffered severe emotional distress, but I don’t know whether that's enough. Even if it is, I'm back to the point about a negligent infliction claim requiring negligence on the part of the defendant.

I’m sure it was very hard for Mr. Beattie to be removed from the band that he helped to found and had been with for 30-some years. But I predict that this claim will be dismissed.

            Breach of duty of loyalty

Mr. Beattie makes several allegations regarding the ways in which Mr. Shanahan breached his duty of loyalty to Mr. Beattie. The only one I’ll address is the allegation related to the termination.

I don’t think this claim will fly, either. The duty of loyalty generally applies to employees in relation to their employers, not the other way around. For example, the claim arises frequently in covenant not to compete cases, where the employee may be secretly competing with the employer or trying to steal away its employees.

Even if the claim could apply to Mr. Beattie, I don’t think it will go anywhere. I don’t see how it’s a breach to terminate an employee or partner over an allegation of harassment, assuming the allegation was credible. On this point, I refer you to the “good-faith honest belief” rule and my recent discussion of a case where an executive sued after he was allegedly falsely accused of sexual harassment. (TL;DR: The employer won, even though the accuser did not.)

            Tortious interference

Finally, Mr. Beattie alleges that his termination resulted in the loss of business opportunities because he was no longer a member of the band. His problem here is that the loss has to be the result of tortious conduct on the part of Mr. Shanahan and the corporation. If the defendants’ conduct related to the termination was not tortious, then he’d have no valid claim. And for the reasons I’ve discussed above, I suspect that the termination-related conduct was not tortious.

In summary, much as I hate to say it, Mr. Beattie, I think your termination claims may not succeed.

In case you, like me, are not a metal aficionado and would like a sample of Hatebreed's music, here is a song that got the band a Grammy nomination.