A Swedish court has thrown out a lawsuit brought by Avicii’s longtime manager Ash Pournouri against the estate of the late Swedish dance music icon – though the legal fight is not yet over.
Pournouri sued Avicii’s heirs in December, alleging they violated a 2016 termination agreement by suggesting in a Netflix documentary and two books that he drove the DJ (Tim Bergling) to suicide. In a March 4 judgment from the Stockholm District Court, obtained by Billboard and translated from Swedish by the service DeepL, Judge Linda Rantén ruled that Pournouri’s lawyers have not met the technical requirements to bring a so-called declaratory action for breach of contract.
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A lawyer for the estate, Thomas Olsson, said in a statement to Billboard that Pournouri’s lawsuit was “completely unfounded” and, “One can only hope that this is a clear message to him to leave this matter behind.” Avicii’s father, Klas Bergling, said, “I just want to say how sad it is to see Tim’s name used in this context.”
“This process has raised strong emotions and a lot of discomfort for me and Tim’s mother Anki,” added Klas. “At the same time, we cannot understand Arash. We have said it several times since 2018, also in public: neither I nor Tim’s mother have ever blamed Arash for Tim’s suicide.”
Pournouri, meanwhile, emphasized in his own statement that Judge Rantén’s ruling was purely procedural and he will continue to pursue his claims in an appeal.
“I deliberately chose a declaratory action without any claim for damages, specifically to avoid burdening the other side with a heavier process than necessary,” Pournouri said. “If the system now forces me into a full claim with all financial and IP consequences attached, that will be a result of the system requirements, not my preference or choice.”
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Pournouri’s lawsuit alleged that when he and Avicii ended their eight‑year professional relationship in 2016, they signed a document barring the DJ or his heirs from public disparagement. But Pournouri said he was subjected to “character assassination” in the 2017 Netflix documentary Avicii: True Stories and two authorized biographies published after Avicii’s 2018 death, 2021’s Tim: The Official Biography of Avicii and 2024’s Avicii: The Life and Music of Tim Bergling.
According to Pournouri, all three of these projects falsely portrayed him as a “manipulative slavedriver” who overworked Avicii and pressured him to keep working despite mental and physical health struggles. Pournouri alleged that the opposite was true: “In fact, Ash was very positive about Tim’s decision to stop touring and saw it as a much needed and welcome turning point.”
Judge Rantén’s March 4 decision held that Pournouri did not have the proper claims to seek a declaratory judgment regarding a breach of the 2016 termination agreement. Swedish law requires such actions to include a clear connection between an alleged wrongdoing and the resulting damage.
“In this case, it is far from certain that the alleged breach of contract has led to damage giving rise to liability for damages. It is therefore not possible to examine whether there has been an act giving rise to liability for damages without assessing whether damage has occurred,” reads the translated ruling. “For these reasons, the district court considers that the plaintiffs’ action for a declaratory judgment regarding liability for damages should not be allowed.”
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