Singer Shawn “Jay-Z” Carter, who famously rapped that he had “99 problems,” apparently has one more.
HSUS says the rapper-clothing designer’s Rocawear line contains a jacket trimmed with raccoon-dog fur.
HSUS purchased the Rocawear “Hunter” jacket, which was incorrectly advertised as containing faux fur, from the Rocawear website and sent it for lab testing to determine the fur’s origin. The test confirmed that the fur came from the raccoon dog, a type of dog bred in China for fur.
In a statement, Rocawear said it will discontinue using the material. “We were not aware that our product included raccoon-dog materials. We have immediately instructed all manufacturers and licensees that no product can be produced using this fur. In addition we have removed those items from our website.”
Fellow music mogul-clothing designer Sean “Diddy” Combs came under fire last month when similar testing revealed that a jacket from his Sean John line contained raccoon-dog fur. Combs yanked the jacket, which was mislabeled as containing raccoon fur, from stores and vowed to use real faux fur on this particular coat in the future.
False advertising and mislabeling of fur garments are violations of federal law. Under current law, items with fur valued at less than $150 are not required to carry a label.
According to the HSUS, testing of fur-trimmed jackets from a variety of designers and retailers revealed that nine out of 10 were found to contain raccoon-dog fur.