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XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX SUN APRIL 14 2002 14:22:08 ET XXXXX DEEP, DEEP POOH-POOH: FINKE LAWSUIT CLAIMS DISNEY IN ENRON-LIKE COVER UP **Exclusive Details* Here's one you won't be reading on Page Six. A reporter fired by the NEW YORK POST after WALT DISNEY CO complained about two of her stories filed a $10 million breach of contract and slander lawsuit late Friday against DISNEY, NEWS CORP and the POST. Pierce O'Donnell of O'Donnell & Shaffer represents Finke in the action, which alleges DISNEY is trying to cover up financial perils from shareholders by trying to silence reporters like Finke. "This really is ENRON all over again!" notes one legal source. MORE "ENRON tried to get reporters fired who were the first to write negative articles. It goes to the heart of the press informing the public, and shareholders....but if companies are in business together, in bed together, how can that happen? DISNEY and NEWS CORP do tons of business together, MOVIES.COM for one thing." O'Donnell, who smoked DISNEY last year in the GO.COM trademark claim for $22 million, has told associates: "This case is why I went to law school!" MORE Finke's Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit lists 11 causes of action, including intentional interference with contract, breach of contract, intentional infliction of emotional distress, libel and slander. The suit stems from her Feb. 19 firing over a pair of articles that ran in the POST on Jan. 29: "Pooh Scandal is ' $hred' Hot" and "Deep Pooh-Pooh". The stories, linked on the DRUDGE REPORT, described the long-running dispute between DISNEY and STEPHEN SLESINGER INC over royalties on Winnie the Pooh merchandise. Finke claims it was not the facts but the "tone" of those articles that antagonized DISNEY executives -- a tone she alleges was created in large part by POST editors through "inflammatory headlines, creating snide illustrations ... altering the text of the articles she had filed, adding references to 'shredding' of documents which did not appear in the Pooh Articles as filed by Finke, and deleting other language." "In their effort to find a scapegoat to punish for unflattering press accounts of DISNEY's behavior 21 days before the DISNEY annual shareholder meeting, DISNEY representatives -- without investigating whether Finke or others were responsible -- publicly blamed Finke for what they did not like, and the POST, instead of supporting Finke and acknowledging its responsibility for the 'tone,' cravenly tried to placate its business associate and major advertiser DISNEY," she alleges. "[DISNEY head Michael] Eisner had a direct pipeline into the POST's newsroom," claims an insider. Eisner's best friend is the father of the NY POST's metro editor. The editor is also best friends with Rupert Murdoch's two sons, James and Lachlan, who oversees the PO |
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