Former bandmates from The Police have sued Sting over alleged lost royalties from multiple songs they recorded together.
Guitarist Andy Summers and drummer Stewart Copeland have reportedly filed a civil suit in the London High Court claiming they were never given writing credits for songs such as “Roxanne” and “Every Breath You Take”, and so were owed compensation based on agreements that were never honoured.
The Police – made up of Sting, Copeland and Summers – are one of the UK’s most successful bands, having sold around 75 million records. The band achieved global success throughout the early 1980s, taking home Brits and Grammys. In 2003, they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
In court documents reported by the BBC on Tuesday, which have been listed under “general commercial contracts and arrangements”, Summers and Copeland claim that although Sting was credited as sole songwriter on tracks, the band worked under an “oral agreement” to share a percentage of publishing income.
They allege that the agreement was later formalised in contracts signed in 1981 and revised in 1995 and 2016. The pair claim they have been underpaid and are seeking damages estimated at £1.5m.
How that arrangement originated is contentious. Summers recalls it being agreed outside their manager’s office in Notting Hill while Sting claims Copeland proposed it on a visit to his Bayswater home, framed as a gesture to “keep things sweet”.
Sting, whose real name is Gordon Sumner, has denied the claims and his lawyers have called them “illegitimate”.
The Independent has reached out to representatives for Sting for comment.
According to the court documents, his lawyers have argued that the existing agreements were honoured, and that the 2016 revision included a clause in which all three members agreed not to pursue any further claims related to past or future royalties.
The dispute primarily centres on the interpretation of how royalties should be split: mechanical royalties, which are generated through physical and digital sales and performance royalties, which are earned when music is played in public, including on the radio or via streaming.
Summers and Copeland have argued that they are entitled to a share of both revenue streams, while Sting has maintained that their agreement only applies to mechanical royalties.
“Every Breath You Take”, released in 1983 and part of the band’s last album Synchronicity, is one of their most revered lucrative tracks.
The song spent eight weeks at number one in the US and has since been recognised by BMI as the most-played song in radio history.
According to a 2009 report in CBS News, Sting earns an estimated $2,000 (£1,495) per day in royalties from the original song.
Even though Sting is credited as the sole writer, Summers has repeatedly argued that his contribution was essential to the track’s success.
“There wasn't a guitar part on it when Sting wrote it,” Summers told Guitar Player in a 2024 interview. “I just went into the studio and I heard the chord sequence for it, and it immediately came to me to play the riff I came up with. It was very much in the Police guitar style, if you like.”
The Police formed in 1977 and disbanded in 1984 after releasing five studio albums. They briefly reunited in 2007 for a world tour marking the band’s 30th anniversary, but recorded no new music.
Relations between the musicians have long been strained, with various interviews over the years alluding to long-standing tensions.
“Ghost in the Machine had taken us into stadiums and then Synchronicity made us even bigger, but the recording sessions were very dark. We beat the crap out of each other. We’ve laughed about it since, but going back into that black hole isn’t something we tended towards,” Copeland told The Guardian in 2024.
Sting too has talked about their difficult working relationship, saying in a 2022 interview to Mojo: “My frustration was I would have written an album’s worth of material but also had to entertain these others songs that were not as good. Explaining to someone why their song isn’t working is a bit like saying their girlfriend’s ugly. That pain was something I didn’t want to go through any more.”
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