Whoever said you can’t go home again never met Kimberly Osorio.
The music magazine editor didn’t just burn her bridges when she left The Source, hip hop’s leading magazine, six years ago after a bitter sexual harassment charge.
She practically firebombed the entire landscape.
But after helping to nearly destroy the magazine with a legal victory that resulted in an $8 million judgment against the publication, the pioneering editor-in-chief who took on The Source, the so-called “bible of hip-hop” is back for a second round.
New owners have put Kimberly Osorio back in charge in a bid to boost sales at the struggling publication.
Although the magazine went into bankruptcy before she was able to collect, Osorio said she is able to put the past behind her, and is eager to get to work.
“This is a new chapter,’ Osorio said. “It’s a different time, just in what we do period, and in hip hop. There was a lot of unfinished business”
Osorio, 37, The Source’s first female editor, said her business was interrupted after she filed a sexual harassment complaint against owners David Mays and Raymond “Benzino” Scott, who was also a rap artist.
After she was fired in 2005, she filed a lawsuit against the company that led to a trial that was as raunchy as a music video.
The trial, in 2006, was filled with testimony about curse-laden tirades, pictures of G-string-wearing women that hung on the walls, screen savers featuring nearly naked women and magazine covers with endless cleavage.
Both sides traded sordid tales about alleged sex romps with the industry’s hottest rappers.
After stints at Global Grind and Black Entertainment Television, Osorio was lured back to The Source by a new owner who wanted to expand the magazine’s Internet presence and restore credibility in an industry he said revels in exploiting women.
“A lot of other hip hop brands gave The Source a bad name,” said Source owner Londell McMillan, an entertainment attorney.
“She just felt right and in sync with the philosophy I’m trying to put out. It’s still the bible of hip hop. But now it’s the new testament.”