Grammy-winning singer Alanis Morissette sued a former tour manager Tuesday, alleging in Los Angeles federal court that she was the victim of a \u201ccalculated blackmail campaign\u201d involving a bag allegedly containing drugs that was seized at an airport in the United Kingdom last year.<\/p>\n
According to the complaint, while temporarily employed to manage a Morissette tour, defendant Keren Urinov admitted to the British Border Force that a bag seized at an airport in the U.K. that allegedly contained marijuana and the animal tranquilizer xylazine belonged to her, not the singer.<\/p>\n
Morissette alleges that Urinov now threatens to report to the British authorities that the bag actually belonged to Morissette and the singer committed drug trafficking \u2014 unless the entertainer agrees to employ Urinov as a tour director for 15 years and pay her \u201cmassive compensation,\u201d the suit states.<\/p>\n
\u201cMorissette will not be coerced into delivering her blackmailer an extraordinary payday,\u201d according to the lawsuit alleging civil extortion and fraud. \u201cShe sues to expose Urinov\u2019s scheme and hold her accountable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Urinov\u2019s attorney could not immediately be reached for comment.<\/p>\n
An ex-head of operations at Live Nation Israel, Urinov filed a claim in the U.K.\u2019s High Court last month against the Los Angeles-based Morissette, according to published reports.<\/p>\n
Morissette\u2019s allegations stem from last year, when Urinov was hired to serve as a temporary tour manager for an upcoming tour.<\/p>\n
On July 12, 2025, Morissette and her team, including Urinov, were due to fly from Farnborough Airport in the U.K. to Spain for one of Morissette\u2019s concerts. According to the suit, a British Border Force official at the airport flagged a bag for further inspection and asked who owned the bag. Urinov spoke up, claiming the bag was hers, the lawsuit states.<\/p>\n
Later, Morissette alleges, Urinov told the singer and her team that the Border Force had arrested her and issued her a seizure notice alleging that the bag contained marijuana and xylazine. During questioning by officials, Urinov admitted to the Border Force that the bag and its contents, including the alleged drugs, belonged to her, the lawsuit contends.<\/p>\n
The lawsuit alleges Urinov said she showed the Border Force her Israeli medical marijuana license, the bag was returned and she was released. The next day, the suit states, Urinov flew to Barcelona to rejoin the tour. Morissette, Urinov and the rest of the team flew back to the United Kingdom the same day.<\/p>\n
After landing, Border Force officers detained Urinov for further questioning about the bag that had been seized the previous day, according to the complaint. Later, Urinov told Morissette and her team that she had once again admitted to the Border Force that the bag and the alleged drugs inside belonged to her, the lawsuit alleges.<\/p>\n
\u201cAfter the tour ended, Urinov and her attorney sent a series of increasingly extortionate letters to Morissette,\u201d the lawsuit contends. \u201cUrinov threatened to file a patently frivolous lawsuit against Morissette in the United Kingdom for unspecified claims if Morissette refused to tell British law enforcement that the alleged drugs were hers. However, Urinov communicated, Morissette could put `an end to the matter\u2019 by entering into a fixed-term, full-time employment contract of fifteen years with Urinov, under which Urinov would receive an income equivalent to that of a tour director with annual increases and bonuses.\u201d<\/p>\n
Morissette contends that Urinov also demanded that Morissette arrange for an immigration attorney to obtain a work visa that would allow Urinov, an Israeli citizen, to work in the United States. If a visa could not be obtained, Urinov demanded additional compensation, the lawsuit alleges.<\/p>\n
\u201cMorissette is not interested in employing Urinov for fifteen years \u2014 not only because she is a blackmailer, but also because she was a terrible manager of the 2025 tour,\u201d according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n
After Morissette refused Urinov\u2019s alleged demands, the ex-tour manager\u2019s lawyers \u201cresponded with a carefully worded letter that clearly implied that Urinov would report Morissette to the British authorities for drug trafficking in addition to suing her unless she capitulated to Urinov\u2019s demands for employment and compensation,\u201d the complaint said.<\/p>\n
Xylazine, commonly known on the street as \u201ctranq,\u201d is a non-opioid animal tranquilizer and central nervous system depressant that is approved only for veterinary use.<\/p>\n
Canadian-born Morissette had a string of chart-topping singles in the 1990s, including \u201cYou Oughta Know,\u201d \u201cHand in My Pocket\u201d and \u201cIronic.\u201d She won the 1996 album of the year Grammy for her debut disc, \u201cJagged Little Pill.\u201d<\/p>\n
She is scheduled to perform a string of dates in November at the YouTube Theater in Inglewood.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Grammy-winning singer Alanis Morissette sued a former tour manager Tuesday, alleging in Los Angeles federal court that she…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":451274,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[178396,31250,25867,24983,15726,48,52,51,47,50,49,2747,178397,17811,18652],"class_list":["post-451273","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-los-angeles","tag-alanis","tag-attempt","tag-claims","tag-extortion","tag-former","tag-la","tag-la-headlines","tag-la-news","tag-los-angeles","tag-los-angeles-headlines","tag-los-angeles-news","tag-manager","tag-morissette","tag-sues","tag-tour"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451273","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=451273"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/451273\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/451274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=451273"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=451273"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=451273"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}