A former sound engineer for Eminem has been charged with stealing and selling the rap icon’s unreleased tracks online—because why settle for a severance package when you can have 25 never-before-heard songs instead?
Federal prosecutors say Joseph Strange, 46, didn’t just walk away from his job—he walked away with highly confidential recordings, stored on password-protected hard drives inside a safe at Eminem’s Detroit studio.
The music mysteriously found its way onto the internet, sparking an FBI investigation that led straight to Strange’s doorstep.
Turns out, Slim Shady’s missing music wasn’t just floating around in cyberspace—it was up for sale! Enter Doja Rat, a Canadian superfan (yes, that’s the actual username), who claims he paid $50,000 in Bitcoin to get his hands on the tracks.
According to the FBI affidavit, Strange had been running a musical black market, also attempting to sell handwritten lyric sheets and even an unreleased Eminem music video on VHS.
Investigators swooped in after Eminem’s associate Fred Nassar sent out a digital wanted poster, warning fans against leaking the stolen songs.
But some die-hard Stans couldn’t resist—another group, led by an online user named ATL, allegedly bought a couple of songs for $1,000.
The FBI raid on Strange’s home in January unearthed 12,000 audio files, lyric sheets, and notes—enough evidence to drop a real-life diss track in court.
Now, Strange faces up to 15 years in prison for copyright infringement and transporting stolen goods. His lawyer, however, insists these are just “untested allegations.”
