Disgraced Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore suffered insult to injury, when — after having lost the special election to Democratic challenger Doug Jones — he was featured on a July 29 episode of Showtime’s mockumentary-style satire series Who is America? In the episode he appeared in, Moore was interviewed by series creator Sacha Baron Cohen in character as the fake “counter-terrorism instructor” Erran Morad, who he allowed subject him to a “pedophile detector” device.
Despite his protests of innocence, Moore, who was accused of preying on underage girls in the scandal that tanked his campaign, managed to set off the machine several times. After learning he had been duped he threatened to sue if Showtime aired the episode, and now Moore is making good on that promise.
And apparently he means business because he’s asking for a whopping $95 million in damages from Cohen, along with CBS and Showtime.
Oh and it gets even better:
“Defendant Cohen’s character falsely and fraudulently introduced a false and fraudulent ‘device’ supposedly invented by the Israeli Army to detect pedophiles,” state the complaint. “During the segment, Defendant Cohen’s ‘device’ — as part of the false and fraudulent routine — purports to detect Judge Moore as a sex offender, thus defaming him.”
As part of his complaint, Moore claims he would not have agreed to fly to D.C. to take part in the episode (which, obviously), and that he has suffered defamation, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and fraud, due to the prank. Of course, by the time it was revealed that this interview took place, Moore’s reputation was already off the rails, so it’s unclear exactly why his attorneys would demand such an outrageous amount in damages. We’ll surely hear a response, either from a court or Cohen, in the days or weeks to come.
(Via Hollywood Reporter)
