Don Henley of the Eagles Band Sues for Return of Original Lyrics to Hotel California

In the continuing saga of the rock band the Eagles co-founder Don Henley's attempt to obtain the handwritten lyrics to songs in their hugely successful Hotel California album, Henley has gone to court to get himself declared the owner. He has been trying over a decade, but the manuscripts were held by other people who claimed they had purchased them from the legal owner, who they claimed was not Henley.

According to the suit filed by Henley (and it needs to be pointed out that this is his side of the story, not that of the other claimants), he demanded that four pages of his lyrics from the song, Hotel California, be returned when he learned they were being offered at auction in 2012. They were in the possession of Edward Kosinski and Craig Inciardi. Both have been associated with the music industry for many years. They declined. So, how did the the lyrics come into their possession?

Henley's explanation was that he gave these and other materials to one Ed Sanders starting in 1979 to write a biography of the Eagles. When Henley was dissatisfied with Sanders' original draft, he gave Sanders more documents to refine his presentation. The book was never published, but the material remained in storage with Sanders.

Again according to Henley, Sanders was approached by book dealer Glenn Horowitz to buy the lyrics to the songs written by Henley and fellow Eagles member Glenn Frey. Sanders agreed, and in 2012, Horowitz sold the material to Kosinski and Inciardi. Henley's suit claims, “Kosinski has a reputation in the music industry for turning a blind eye to provenance and title in pursuit of ill-gotten profits from unauthorized auctions of music memorabilia on GHRR (“Gotta Have Rock and Roll,” Kosinski's auction site).

The complaint continues that Kosinski and Inciardi offered to sell the Hotel California lyrics to Henley for $10,000, and that despite believing he was already the legal owner, Henley agreed to pay $8,500 to get them back. However, Henley later learned that Kosinski and Inciardi had 100 pages of other documents covering the rest of the songs on the California album, and resisted making further payments to obtain them.

This brings us to the next part of this story, and Henley's suit's description of events as it gets really messy here and there is undoubtedly another side to it. Henley's attorney, Jordan Bromley, then contacted Kosinski and Inciardi. According to Henley's complaint, “Bromley’s March 28, 2012 phone call started a race in Kosinski and Inciardi’s camp to fabricate a story about how Sanders had come to possess Henley’s five legal pads and had the right to sell them.” The claim continues that since Horowitz was their link to Sanders, Inciardi sent Horowitz an email of a statement for Horowitz to pass on to Sanders. He suggested Sanders explain his possession by writing, “I remember finding the material discarded in a dressing room backstage at an Eagles concert.”

According to Henley's complaint, Inciardi, Horowitz, and Sanders cycled through a few potential, explanations as to how Sanders obtained the papers. “First, Sanders proposed a vague description of his source: 'He worked in some capacity for the band. He was a stage assistant, I think. I received bountiful material from many sources, and this guy was just one of many.'” It was next suggested that the material was “destined for the scrap pile.” The others discussed among themselves that they needed to reassure Sanders that he would not end up going to jail.

Continuing from the complaint, “Inciardi and Sanders subsequently agreed that Sanders would not describe any specific source to make their story harder to disprove.” Inciardi followed up with a statement for Sanders to send GHRR auctions, “Please be advised that I do in fact recognize the Eagles lyrics in your recent auction. They were given to me in the 1970’s when I was writing a biography on the band. During this time, I was given a lot of material related to the Eagles from different people and I do not remember specifically who gave these items to me.” Kosinski, Inciardi and Sanders “finally settled on their fabricated story” and Kosinski then forwarded it to Henley's attorney, Bromley.

At this point, Henley did not know that Kosinki and Inciardi had any more of the Hotel California documents besides the four pages of lyrics to the title song. That is when the $8,500 settlement was reached, “To avoid litigation expense and expedite the return of the lyric sheets,” according to Henley's plea. Henley thought that was the end.

It would be almost two years later that Kosinski and Inciardi brought the lyrics to Life in the Fast Lane, another song off the Hotel California album, to Sotheby's to sell. That is when Henley learned that they had more of his documents than just the four pages. Sotheby's did not make a sale, and Kosinski and Inciardi again made an offer to sell the documents to Henley, this time for $12,000. Henley refused. Kosinski and Inciardi went back to Sotheby's to make a private sale, but none was made. They next approached Christie's, who the claim says provided a draft agreement that Inciardi would receive no less than $700,000 in a private sale of 13 pages. However, Christie's returned the pages when they were unable to get a satisfactory proof of provenance.

Inciardi brought the pages back to Sotheby's to attempt an auction again. When notice of the sale was discovered, Bromley's law partner, Eric Custer, demanded Sotheby's return the material to Henley. Kosinski and Inciardi made another offer to Henley – split the proceeds of the auction 50-50 or they would pay Henley $90,000 for the 13 pages. Henley again refused. Sotheby's dilemma was resolved when New York Police Department detectives seized the pages from Sotheby's. They had been told of Henley's claim by his representatives.

Continuing Henley's account in his legal complaint, in 2017 Horowitz emailed Sanders that it was time to name the person who gave him the pages of lyrics. He suggested he name Henley's Eagles partner, Glenn Frey. Frey had died in 2016, so obviously he would not be disputing the claim. He emailed Sanders, “In an earlier communication you once suggested Frey was the person from whom you got the document. If Frey, he, alas, is dead and identifying him as the the [sic] source would make this go away once and for all. Your thoughts, please?”

When Sanders asked what was the purpose of this, Horowitz explained it would get both of them “out of the picture for good.” Sanders then drafted a statement saying, “During 1979 I was researching and writing a history of the band, the Eagles. I asked Glenn Frey, a long time friend, who had brought me into the project, for some examples of songwriting. He supplied some lyric sheets for some songs and voluminous other material on the history of the band.”

The problem with this is that Sanders had written Horowitz a different story in 2005 about how he came in possession of the material. Henley's suit says Horowitz suggested fabricating another story to explain the difference between the 2005 account and the current one. He wrote Sanders that the earlier statement “...contradicts what you sent me about Frey. Were you protecting Frey while he was alive? I’m meeting with the DA tomorrow.” Sanders responded, “I was shielding Frey.” Apparently, he would have been shielding Frey from Henley's wrath over giving the material away.

The New York District attorney obtained warrants and seized more documents from Kosinski's home. A Grand Jury indicted Kosinski, Inciardi and Horowitz on charges “including criminal possession of stolen property and conspiracy.” The case went to trial on February 21, 2024.

At this point, the case took a decidedly negative turn for Henley. The Judge ruled that Henley's representatives had deliberately used the attorney-client privilege to hide essential documents from the defense they believed would be damaging to the prosecution. Henley then waived the privilege and turned over 6,000 documents mid-trial, but it was too late. The prosecution withdrew the case. Representatives of the defendants pointed out that they were not charged with theft, but that the person who allegedly committed the theft, Sanders, was not even charged. They also noted that there was no evidence that Sanders stole the documents. They said the case never should have been brought in the first place.

So that is where we are today. The lyrics remain with the District Attorney, and the Court has not told him what to do with them. They can only order they be returned to the rightful owner, but they do not know who that is. So, this suit by Henley is one for declaratory judgment, a judgment that the papers belong to Henley. Almost certainly, Kosinski and Inciardi will have a different story to tell. We are waiting to hear their side as so far, we have only heard from one side. Stay tuned.

What are we to make of this? There are things hard to figure on both sides. If Henley owned the papers, why did he wait 25 years to request them back? If Kosinski and Inciardi owned them, why did they agree to sell the centerpiece of the collection, lyrics to Hotel California, for $8,500? It was easily worth six figures, possible several hundreds of thousands of dollars. The courts are going to have to unravel this mystery.