Times Sued by Broadcaster Jane Pauley Over Advertising Supplement
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The New York Times Company is being sued by broadcaster Jane Pauley, who says the newspaper “duped” her into lending her name and image to an advertising supplement on behalf of drugmakers such as Eli Lilly & Co.
The fraud and right-to-privacy suit, filed on October 23 in federal court in Manhattan, seeks undetermined money damages and a ruling blocking the Times from using Ms. Pauley’s words or photo. The suit also names DeWitt Publishing, which produces advertising circulars inserted into the Times.
Ms. Pauley, who was previously cohost of The Today Show and Dateline NBC for General Electric Co.’s NBC television unit, says she was led to believe that she was giving an interview for an article on mental health issues that would appear in a news supplement to the Times magazine.
The Times and DeWitt “attempted to camouflage the advertising supplement as news,” Ms. Pauley says in her lawsuit. The defendants sought “to blur the line between advertising and news and thus, increase readership (and consequently the fees charged to the advertisers).”
New York Times officials didn’t immediately return a call seeking comment. The company said on October 19 that third-quarter profit shrank 39% as advertising demand waned.
The advertising supplement, which identified itself as such, appeared on October 30, 2005, Ms. Pauley said. Her name and a full-page photo appeared on the cover of the supplement, which included ads for Lilly and other pharmaceutical companies, she said.
Indianapolis-based Lilly isn’t a defendant in the case.
Ms. Pauley became an advocate for the mentally ill after disclosing in September 2004 that she suffers from bipolar disorder. She says she refuses to act as a spokeswoman for any product other than charities and non-commercial ventures.
Ms. Pauley says she was led to believe that she would be interviewed by a New YorkTimes reporter. Instead, her interviewer turned out to be a DeWitt employee, a fact Ms. Pauley says she didn’t discover until after the supplement appeared.
“Defendants have traded upon, and gained public acceptance and other benefits from Pauley’s favorable reputation,” she says in her suit.
