{"id":2286,"date":"2012-02-12T21:29:20","date_gmt":"2012-02-12T21:29:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/whisnews21.com\/?p=2286"},"modified":"2012-02-12T21:29:20","modified_gmt":"2012-02-12T21:29:20","slug":"jim-reeves-royalty-dispute-ends-after-12-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/2012\/02\/12\/jim-reeves-royalty-dispute-ends-after-12-years\/","title":{"rendered":"Jim Reeves Royalty Dispute Ends After 12 Years"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>JIM REEVES ROYALTY DISPUTE ENDS\u00a0 <\/strong>After more than 12 years of waiting, justice has been served, and Terry Davis is a loser again. The following article details what Davis is entitled to. Jim & Mary Reeves can now rest in peace…Marty Martel<\/strong><\/p>\n

Jim Reeves royalty dispute ends<\/span><\/h1>\n

Husband of singer’s widow won’t get share, court rules<\/span>\u00a0 <\/span><\/strong>A long-running legal battle over the fate of 1960s country singer \u201cGentleman\u201d Jim Reeves\u2019 music royalties ended this week with a ruling that his wife\u2019s second husband isn\u2019t entitled to claim a share.<\/h2>\n

Terry Davis married Jim Reeves\u2019 widow, Mary, in 1969, five years after Reeves and his piano player were killed in a Brentwood plane crash. Mary Reeves Davis died in 1999. Davis is not entitled to any further share of his late wife<\/a>\u2019s estate than the $100,000 she specified in her will, Judge Randy Kennedy ruled at the end of a legal fight that has gone on for more than a dozen years. That money<\/a> was distributed years ago. Davis had sought a percentage of the estate and a year\u2019s worth of spousal support instead.<\/p>\n

Jim Reeves\u2019 niece, who is among the heirs who have been fighting Davis\u2019 claim to the estate for more a decade, said she was relieved by the ruling. \u201cThe wheels of justice move slowly,\u201d said Lani Thomas Arnold, who traveled from her home in Shreveport, La., for the three-day trial. Arnold is the daughter of Jim Reeves\u2019 sister, Vergie Reeves Thomas. \u201cThere were a lot of ups and downs in this case. I do feel like we had our day in court,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen I went into this, it was for my aunt, and I think she would have been happy with how the case turned out.\u201d Terry Davis could not be reached for comment.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>The fate of the royalties and all the intellectual properties associated with Jim Reeves\u2019 musical career will now be decided among the remaining heirs, including Mary Reeves Davis\u2019 relatives, Arnold said. Court records indicate royalties have amounted to as much as $400,000 annually for the singer, whose popularity overseas continues to remain strong. A formal appraisal of the value of Reeves\u2019 musical legacy was filed under seal in court. Reeves was a country music sensation when he died at the age of 39. He may be best known for the lyric \u201cPut your sweet lips a little closer to the phone,\u201d but Reeves stayed on the charts from 1970 through 1984 because of how his widow, Mary, managed his posthumous career. His most popular songs included \u201cHe\u2019ll Have to Go\u201d and \u201cWelcome to My World.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joyce Jackson, who served for 30 years as secretary to Jim Reeves and then to Mary after the artist\u2019s death, said she was pleased with the ruling. \u201cIt\u2019s long overdue,\u201d said Jackson, who said she was bequeathed $10,000 in Mary\u2019s will but has not received the money because of the ongoing legal battle. Jackson attended the trial each day but was not a party to the lawsuit. The trial, she said, made her think of Reeves. \u201cHe\u2019ll be gone 48 years this July, the 31st, and I don\u2019t feel like there\u2019s that many artists that still maintain the kind of popularity he does internationally,\u201d said Jackson, who at 76 recently retired from Wal-Mart, where she worked as a cashier. \u201cHe is still revered around the whole world. I honestly don\u2019t feel like Jim gets the recognition he deserves for pioneering country music.\u201d<\/p>\n

Reach Anita Wadhwani at 615-259-8092 or awadhwani@tennessean.com<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Written by Anita Wadhwani<\/a>\u00a0The Tennessean<\/h6>\n

This column sent in by Marty Martel<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

JIM REEVES ROYALTY DISPUTE ENDS\u00a0 After more than 12 years of waiting, justice has been served, and Terry Davis is a loser again. The following article details what Davis is entitled to. Jim & Mary Reeves can now rest in peace…Marty Martel Jim Reeves royalty dispute ends Husband of singer’s widow won’t get share, court rules\u00a0 A long-running legal battle over the fate of 1960s country singer \u201cGentleman\u201d Jim Reeves\u2019 music royalties ended this week with a ruling that his wife\u2019s second husband isn\u2019t entitled to claim a share. Terry<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2288,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2286"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2286\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/whisnews21.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}