Robin Thicke’s team reportedly made Marvin Gaye’s family a six-figure offer in an effort to avert a nasty copyright-infringement battle, but the family rejected it, Billboard reports. According to sources knowledgeable with the lawsuit, the settlement offer came after Frankie Christian Gaye, Marvin Gaye III and Nona Marvisa Gaye accused Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” hit single…

Calling it “questionable” that George Zimmerman was acquitted in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, former Secretary of State Colin Powell expressed uncertainty about whether the case would have lasting power in the public’s mind, the Associated Press reports. Speaking on CBS’s Face the Nation, Powell said cases like Martin’s “blaze across the midnight sky”…

Tens of thousands of people came to the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial on Saturday to observe the 50th anniversary of the famous march, the Associated Press reports. Speakers called for marchers to continue fighting for King’s dream, saying it includes equality for gays, Hispanics, the poor and disabled. The event was an homage to…

When family members attended Sharolyn Jackson’s funeral and burial August 3, some noted that her nose looked thinner, the Associated Press reports. They, however, figured something happened during the embalming process. But they were wrong. The truth is far stranger: The woman they buried that day was not, in fact, their loved one but a…

Attorneys on Friday agreed to drop a discrimination and sexual harassment lawsuit against Paula Deen, who lost contracts with the Food Network and other partners after she said under oath that she had used racial slurs in the past, the Associated Press reports. A document filed in U.S. District Court in Savannah said both sides…

WNYT-TV is reporting that a Schenectady County, N.Y., black business owner’s surveillance cameras captured an undercover police informant planting and photographing crack cocaine, which ultimately led to the man’s arrest. Schenectady County police reportedly were suspicious of Donald Andrews Jr., who owns a smoke shop in Scotia, N.Y., and decided to send the undercover informant…

In a surprise move, President Barack Obama called Antoinette Tuff, the Georgia woman credited with helping prevent a school shooting, to thank her for her courage, the Associated Press reports. The White House says Obama spoke with Antoinette Tuff on Thursday while in New York, where he is on an education-focused bus trip. The White House…

Rapper J. Cole, an award nominee at this year’s MTV Video Music Awards, discussed a range of issues during a recent interview with BET, including racial profiling and colorism in hip-hop. The North Carolina native said, “I might not be as successful as I am now if I was dark skin.” He said that’s the…

Rolling Out is reporting that a forensic report may prove that a white Georgia woman, Sherry West, wrongly implicated two teens in the slaying of her son. De’Marquis Elkins, 17, and Dominique Lang, 15, were arrested and charged in the March death of 13-month-old Antonio Santiago. But their public defender, Jonathan Lockwood, uncovered some shocking evidence, the…