Key Takeaways
- Former Eminem engineer Joseph Strange is scheduled to plead guilty Oct. 22 to criminal copyright infringement after admitting he leaked at least 10 copies of an unreleased track.
- Prosecutors will drop a stolen-goods charge carrying up to ten years in prison, while Strange still faces up to five years on the copyright count.
- Investigators say Strange sold unreleased music for Bitcoin—including roughly $50,000 from one buyer—after working with Eminem from 2007 until 2021.
An engineer who formerly worked with Eminem is set to reach a plea deal after he was accused of leaking and selling the Detroit rapper’s unreleased music.
As reported by The Detroit News, federal court records show that 48-year-old Joseph Strange is scheduled to plead guilty on October 22 to one count of criminal copyright infringement, for which he could be sentenced to up to five years in federal prison. As part of his plea deal, in which he will admit to leaking roughly ten copies of an unreleased Eminem track between July 2024 and January 2025, he will no longer face the interstate transportation of stolen goods charge.
“The parties have been negotiating a resolution in this matter to spare everyone’s resources,” said Wade Fink, the attorney representing Strange. “But it will only happen if that result is fair to my client. I expect him to do what is best for himself and his family. The truth, though, is a far cry from what the allegations claim.”
Joseph Strange, who previously worked as an engineer for Em, was hit with the charges last year. In January, 2025, at least 25 unreleased tracks by Eminem, recorded between 1998 and 2018, started to appear online. The songs were later found on a hard drive in Strange’s Detroit home during an FBI raid that same month.
“As we stated at the outset of this case, the significant damage caused by Joe Strange cannot be overstated,” added Eminem’s spokesman, Dennis Dennehy. “Strange was trusted to protect Eminem’s artistic output, and while it’s satisfying to see him held accountable for his criminal conduct, we hope he will be punished to the fullest extent of the law. The levels of lying, deception and criminality undertaken by this man over the course of years are unfathomable, unforgettable and both legally and morally reprehensible.”
Strange started working as an engineer in 2007, and is credited as an engineer on all of his albums from 2009’s Relapse to 2020’s Music to Be Murdered By. He was ultimately let go in 2021. The hard drive recovered at his Detroit home contained several unreleased songs by Eminem, and the rapper’s current employees said they recognized the unreleased material as belonging to a hard drive taken from a studio at which Eminem recorded.
Investigators have located multiple individuals who purchased the music from Strange, including an Ontario resident who said he sent $50,000 worth of Bitcoin to Strange in exchange for the unreleased material.
