In the mid-Nineteen Seventies, the Eagles have been engaged on a spooky, cryptic new music.

On a lined yellow pad, Don Henley, with enter from band co-founder Glenn Frey, jotted ideas about “a dark desert highway” and “a lovely place” with an opulent floor and ominous undertones. And one thing on ice, maybe caviar or Taittinger — or pink Champagne?

The music, “Hotel California,” turned one in all rock’s most indelible singles. And practically a half-century later, these handwritten pages of lyrics-in-the-making have develop into the middle of an uncommon prison trial set to open Wednesday.

Rare-book vendor Glenn Horowitz, former Rock & Roll Hall of Fame curator Craig Inciardi and memorabilia vendor Edward Kosinski are charged with conspiring to personal and attempt to promote manuscripts of “Hotel California” and different Eagles hits with out the fitting to take action.

The three have pleaded not responsible, and their attorneys have mentioned the lads dedicated no crime with the papers, which they acquired by way of a author who’d labored with the Eagles. But the Manhattan district lawyer’s workplace says the defendants connived to obscure the paperwork’ disputed possession, regardless of understanding that Henley mentioned the pages have been stolen.

Clashes over invaluable collectibles abound, however prison trials like this are uncommon. Many fights are resolved in non-public, in lawsuits or with agreements to return the objects.

“If you may keep away from a prosecution by handing over the factor, most individuals simply hand it over,” mentioned Travis McDade, a University of Illinois regulation professor who research uncommon doc disputes.

Of course, the case of the Eagles manuscripts is distinctive in different methods, too.

The prosecutors’ star witness is certainly that: Henley is predicted to testify between Eagles tour stops. The non-jury trial may supply a peek into the band’s inventive course of and life within the quick lane of ’70s stardom.

At concern are over 80 pages of draft lyrics from the blockbuster 1976 “Hotel California” album, together with phrases to the chart-topping, Grammy-winning title lower. It options one in all traditional rock’s most recognizable riffs, best-known solos and most oft-quoted — arguably overquoted — strains: “You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave.”

Henley has mentioned the music is about “the darkish underbelly of the American dream.”

It nonetheless was streamed over 220 million instances and acquired 136,000 radio spins final 12 months within the U.S. alone, in keeping with the leisure knowledge firm Luminate. The “Hotel California” album has offered 26 million copies nationwide over time, bested solely by an Eagles’ best hits disc and Michael Jackson’s “Thriller.”

The pages additionally embody lyrics from songs together with “Life in the Fast Lane” and “New Kid in Town.” Eagles supervisor Irving Azoff has referred to as the paperwork “irreplaceable pieces of musical history.”

Horowitz, Inciardi and Kosinki are charged with conspiracy to own stolen property and numerous different offenses.

They’re not charged with truly stealing paperwork. Nor is anybody else, however prosecutors will nonetheless have to ascertain that the paperwork have been stolen. The protection maintains that is not true.

Much activates the Eagles’ interactions with Ed Sanders, a author who additionally co-founded the Sixties counterculture rock band the Fugs. He labored within the late ‘70s and early ’80s on a certified Eagles biography that was by no means revealed.

Sanders isn’t charged within the case. A cellphone message searching for remark was left for him.

He offered the pages to Horowitz, who then offered them to Inciardi and Kosinski.

Horowitz has dealt with big uncommon e-book and archive offers, and he is been entangled in some possession spats earlier than. One concerned papers linked to “Gone With the Wind″ creator Margaret Mitchell. It was settled.

Inciardi labored on notable exhibitions for the Cleveland-based Rock Hall of Fame. Kosinski has been a principal in Gotta Have It! Collectibles, identified for auctioning celebrities’ private possessions — so private that Madonna unsuccessfully sued to attempt to cease a sale that included her latex briefs.

Henley advised a grand jury he by no means gave the biographer the lyrics, in keeping with courtroom filings from Kosinski’s attorneys. But protection attorneys have signaled that they plan to probe Henley’s reminiscence of the time.

“We believe that Mr. Henley voluntarily provided the lyrics to Mr. Sanders,” lawyer Scott Edelman mentioned in courtroom final week.

Sanders advised Horowitz in 2005 that whereas engaged on the Eagles e-book, he was despatched no matter papers he wished from Henley’s dwelling in Malibu, California, in keeping with the indictment.

Then Kosinski’s enterprise supplied some pages at public sale in 2012. Henley’s attorneys got here knocking. And Horowitz, Inciardi and Sanders, in various combos, started batting round alternate variations of the manuscripts’ provenance, the indictment says.

In one story, Sanders discovered the pages discarded in a backstage dressing room. In others, he acquired them from a stage assistant or whereas amassing “numerous materials associated to the Eagles from completely different folks.” In yet another, he obtained them from Frey — an account that “would make this go away once and for all,” Horowitz recommended in 2017. Frey had died the 12 months earlier than.

“He merely needs gentle handling and reassurance that he’s not going to the can,” Horowitz emailed Inciardi throughout a 2012 change about getting Sanders’ “‘explanation’ shaped into a communication” to auctioneers, the indictment says.

Sanders provided or signed off on a number of the various explanations, in keeping with the indictment, and it’s unclear what he could have conveyed verbally. But he apparently rejected a minimum of the dressing-room story.

Kosinki forwarded one rationalization, accredited by Sanders, to Henley’s lawyer. Kosinski additionally assured Sotheby’s public sale home that the musician had “no claim” to the paperwork and requested to maintain potential bidders at midnight about Henley’s complaints, the indictment says.

Sotheby’s listed the “Hotel California” music lyrics in a 2016 public sale however withdrew them after studying the possession was in query. Sotheby’s is not charged within the case and declined to remark.

Henley purchased some draft lyrics privately from Gotta Have It! for $8,500 in 2012, when he additionally started submitting police studies, in keeping with courtroom filings.

Defense attorneys declare Henley discovered starstruck prosecutors to take up his trigger as a substitute of pursuing a civil go well with himself.

The DA’s workplace labored intently with Henley’s authorized staff, and an investigator even yearned for backstage passes for an Eagles present — till a prosecutor mentioned the thought was “completely inappropriate,” Kosinki’s attorneys mentioned in courtroom papers.

Prosecutors have rebuffed questions on their motivations as “a conspiracy theory rather than a legal defense.”

Last 12 months, they wrote in courtroom papers, “It is the defendants, not the prosecutors, who’re on trial.”

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