For the record, I have now had a chance to quickly read over the actual complaint filed by Hester ( http://www.radaronline.com/sites/radaronline.com/files/David-Hester-Files-Complaint-Against-A&E.pdf ).
He does explicitly refer to the Communications Act of 1934 (though I believe the relevant passages were added in 1960 after the quiz show scandals). However his suit is not based primarily on A&E breaking this Act, as much as it is a wrongful termination suit in which he claims that he was fired because he complained about what he believed to be unethical and possibly illegal (under the Act) misleading of the public about the salting of the lockers. In the first paragraph he just flatly asserts the show violates the Communications Act, but later, in the more specific part of the complaint, he softens that with possibly violates the Act, and his main argument is that, whether it violates that Act or not, the deception does violate fundamental principles of California public policy - namely that an employer can not fire an employee for questioning potentially deceptive or illegal employer business practices. He is also complaining about some technical violations of the terms of his contract - when renewals have to be honored and the consequences of not doing so, etc. So, while he is invoking the Communications Act, I don't think his suit depends on Storage Wars qualifying as a game show for the purposes of the 1960 revision. His argument is that he has a right to go public with his concerns that it might be violating the Com Act, or unethically be deceiving the public, and he can not be fired (more specifically I think, not have his contract renewed) for doing so. The real money quote in the complaint is in the introduction, which states that Storage Wars "intends to be a truthful 'reality series' depicting people bidding at auctions of abandoned storage". So he is not really saying the program is a game show, but he is saying that the show intends itself to be taken as a true and accurate presentation of how these auctions work. As several here have already noted, that is the obvious flaw in his argument - could he really find a majority of any jury, or a single judge, to find that 'reality series" are really intended to be taken as truthful and accurate depictions of anything? Hester appears to think he has a smoking gun, in A&E's famous (to fans of the show) reply to previous questions about salting the units that "there is no staging involved The items uncovered in the storage units are the actual items featured on the show". However, as many people I have talked with and interacted with about this quote for more than a year have pointed out, it is careful and specific enough that salting of the units could be happening and the quote could still be technically true. The second sentence qualifies the meaning of "staging" in the first to mean simply that the items featured on the show are items that found in the units when the bidders unlock them after winning the auction. That does not preclude producers from having added items to the lockers before the auction or after the auction but before the winners opened them up. Whatever the legal issues here, the psychological issues (more my area of expertise) are clear. Hester's persona on the show (and it seems, in real life) is that he sees himself as the only real professional storage unit bidder. The other players are their for the entertainment value of the show. He is irritated that he is not given his rightful place as the true star of the show, and no doubt insisted on a sizable raise, which the producers seem to have refused. He is also resentful when the show depicts other bidders as being more successful than him when they win with large bids that are not justified by the quick inspection of the contents, but payoff with the hidden, presumably salted, treasures. Hence the complaints repeated reference to the other players as "weaker bidders", and the ungentlemanly revelation about Brandi's boob job (also not really a secret to fans of the show, though there was no way to confirm that A&E or the producers had paid for it). I think the biggest revelation in the suit is the amount of money these guys get paid - $25K per episode, and Hester is arguing he is due $750 K total for the season he was, in his mind, improperly fired from. At those rates, one wonders why they balk at going just $50 more for that interesting unit with the jewelry box in it. When you get paid $25K per auction, how bad can it be to lose $500 on one bad bid? Again, the real cause of action here would seem to be non-paid bidders who have been told they are attending a public auction (though perhaps they sign some kind of release that covers this). -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en
