The 'Janice STFU' Lawsuit Against Drake Lasted 11 Days. The Accuser Just Walked Away, for Now

Eleven days. That's how long the lawsuit claiming Drake stole the chorus of "Janice STFU" survived. On Tuesday, Oct. 27, lawyers for Oregon producer Aviel Calev Hirschfield moved to voluntarily dismiss the case, Billboard reported. No reason given. Dismissed "without prejudice," which means he could refile later.

Remember how loud this was. The suit, filed Oct. 16, claimed Hirschfield wrote eight lines that appear verbatim in the song, and that the Iceman single's chorus was "literally identical" to his: "word-for-word, note-for-note, beat-by-beat, the exact same chorus," according to Billboard. That's not a sounds-kind-of-similar case. That's a you-took-my-song case. "Janice STFU" spent two weeks at No. 1 on the Hot 100 and 20 weeks atop Hot Rap Songs, Drake's longest run there.

Drake's camp went nuclear on day one. His reps called it a "manufactured and baseless attempt to exploit Drake's name," and wrote, "There is not one iota of truth to these accusations," Billboard reported. Court papers show Drake's team believes Hirschfield fabricated evidence, the outlet reported. That is their allegation; no court ruled on it.

Rolling Stone dug into the backstory. Hirschfield said he started writing a chorus inspired by Lykke Li's 2011 song "I Follow Rivers" while driving to Seattle in a friend's borrowed Maybach, and that it ended up verbatim on Drake's record within six months. A demo with a pitched-down vocal leaked on X; his rep said "multiple experts" vouched for the file's metadata. Internet sleuths questioned it. And Rolling Stone pointed out a timeline problem: how could he write to a beat in January 2026 when another producer on the song told Billboard the beat didn't exist until March?

His biggest prior credit is real. Hirschfield is one of the credited writers on "Heated" from Beyoncé's Renaissance, where Drake is also a credited writer, Rolling Stone reported. The suit leaned on that connection. Rolling Stone said the case was dropped days after it sent his lawyer more follow-up questions.

My take, labeled as my take: a voluntary dismissal 11 days in, after your opponent says you faked evidence and a magazine starts asking about your timeline, doesn't look like a strategy. It looks like a retreat. But "without prejudice" means I can't call it over, and I won't say the claim was false when no judge has said so. Neither Hirschfield's lawyers nor Drake's reps commented to Billboard.

What we still don't know: why the case was dropped, whether Hirschfield will refile, and whether Drake's team will go after him for the fabrication it alleges.