Janice Smalls fired back at a decades-old lawsuit claiming she helped Diddy steal Bad Boy ownership from Kirk Burrowes.
Janice Smalls is calling BS on a lawsuit that claims she helped her son Diddy screw over a former Bad Boy exec out of millions—saying she had nothing to do with that mess and wants the whole thing tossed.
The 84-year-old mom of the Hip-Hop mogul is fighting back in Manhattan federal court, where Kirk Burrowes is suing over a piece of Bad Boy Entertainment he says was snatched from him back in the ’90s.
Burrowes is coming for Diddy, his longtime lawyer Kenneth Meiselas, and now Smalls—claiming she played clean-up crew after he was allegedly forced to give up his 25% stake and 15% profit cut in 1996.
Smalls says that’s all cap.
In new court papers, she’s asking the judge to shut it down, saying she’s never owned a piece of Bad Boy, had zero involvement in the alleged strong-arm play and hasn’t even lived in New York since 2012.
She’s been in Florida, minding her business and paying taxes like everyone else.
Burrowes has already tried to get this case off the ground—twice.
First in 2003, then again in state court. Both got booted for being way past the deadline. Smalls’ lawyers say this third try is more of the same, calling it “frivolous” and “preposterous.”
Burrowes claims Diddy and Meiselas threatened him into signing over his stake and says Smalls later helped hide the whole thing.
He even says she admitted it at a Diana Ross party in 2019. But Smalls’ team says even if that were true, the statute of limitations still ran out before Burrowes filed in 2025.
The legal squad also argues that the fraud claims don’t have the receipts required under court rules, and that the rest of the lawsuit is just a remix of old contract beefs dressed up as new charges.
They say the “unjust enrichment” and “conversion” claims are basically the same thing, that the consumer fraud law doesn’t apply, and that “civil conspiracy” isn’t even a valid claim in New York without a real crime to back it.
Bottom line, Smalls says she’s not the villain here and wants out of this legal circus.
The judge hasn’t ruled yet, and Burrowes’ lawyers haven’t said a word.
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