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Mariah Carey Awarded $92K in Court Costs
- Curtis Newart
- Jan 1
- 2 min read
Country novelty singer Andy Stone (aka Vince Vance) lost his $20 million infringement lawsuit against Mariah Carey in March 2025, and has now been ordered to pay $92,000 US to her for court costs, according to various sources.
NME magazine reported that Stone (and co-plaintiff Troy Powers) filed a lawsuit against Carey (and her co-writer Walter Afanasieff, among others) in a Los Angeles federal court in November 2023, alleging that her 1994 song "All I Want For Christmas Is You" infringed the copyright of his 1989 song of the same name, and that she had exploited his "popularity" and "style".
"If you look at both songs, you can see that about 50 per cent of the words are the same, in almost the same order. I think it’s a pretty strong claim," Stone's lawyer said at the time.
NME further reported that Judge Monica Ramirez Almadini dismissed the case in March 2025, ruling that Stone’s lawyers failed to meet their burden of showing that the two songs were "substantially similar".
"The judge cited expert testimony asserting that the songs simply shared 'Christmas song cliches' that had been present in several earlier songs."
Carey was awarded $92,303.20 in sanctions on December 23rd by Judge Almadani, according to PEOPLE magazine. The judge wrote that she was awarding the sanctions in part “for purposes of punishment and deterrence.”
Last month, Carey's "All I Want For Christmas Is You" broke the record for most consecutive weeks at #1 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart (20 weeks). It currently sits at #1 on the chart, for a record-extending 22nd week.
