Piers Morgan Uncensored - 'Real Martha' From Baby Reindeer Lawyer: Fiona Harvey WILL Take The Stand

Episode Date: June 18, 2024

Fiona Harvey, the "real Martha" from Baby Reindeer, is suing Netflix for a whopping 175 million dollars. The 34-page lawsuit claims the streaming giant is responsible for "the biggest lie in TV history" over its portrayal as Fiona as a twice-convicted and twice-jailed stalker. Its also contends that Netflix 'did nothing' to prevent Harvey from being identified and that, as a result, her life has been 'ruined'.  Media commentators say the result of the case could change how 'true stories' are portrayed in TV and cinema forever.  Fiona Harvey’s U.S. legal representative, Richard Roth, joins Piers from New York.... Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Sunday Times over in the UK reporter, they had a source who said Richard Gabb was against calling it a true story, but Netflix insisted it needed to be. How significant could that be if that turns out to be true? It's one thing if Richard Gadd says to them, it's true, it's true or true, and they fail to do their due diligence. It's even worse is if Richard Gad says, well, I don't really want this to be a true story. And Netflix says, no, no, no, no, we want it to be true. Fiona Harvey, the real Martha from Baby Reindeer, is suing Netflix for a whopping $175 million. The 34-page lawsuit claims the streaming giant is responsible for the biggest lie in TV history over its portrayal as Fiona as a twice convicted and twice jailed stalker.

It also contains that Netflix did nothing to prevent Harvey from being identified and that as a result, her life has been ruined. Well, media commentators say the result of the case could change her true stories are portrayed in TV and citizens. forever. Well, Fiona Harvey's U.S. legal representative, Richard Roth, joins me now from New York. Mr. Roth, thank you very much for David, joining me. Hey, Pierce, thank you for having me. But my first question is an obvious one, but why have you taken Fiona's case? I think there's probably three reasons. Obviously, I'm in the business of making money, and I think there's a lot of money to be made here. I think the second reason is that it is really

just reprehensible when someone says something's a true story and it isn't. We know we deal, You and I, I just heard your last interview, deal with fake news all the time. And if Netflix is going to say this is a true story, then it better well be true. And to do that is irresponsible. And the third reason is that Fiona Harvey is, you've had her on your show. She's been destroyed. She's been shattered by this. She gets death threat.

She doesn't want to leave her apartment. So there's really three main reasons, all of which are really important. What do you believe will end up being the story? smoking gun of this case? There's a lot of smoking guns. The first is, and I've heard, I familiar had myself with your interview, a prior interview with Mark Garagos, great lawyer and other people. And one of the big smoking guns, which is actually what he pointed to, is that you don't

put this as a true story on the front first frame of a six-part series unless it's gone through the ringer. Who actually said it's a true story? It wasn't done by did legal look at it. And so it's not a true story. I mean, we know it's incontrovertible. It is not a true story. There's clear falsities in it, which are very damning.

So I think one thing is going to be what did Netflix do to determine whether or not this was a true story? It's clearly not. Yeah, and not only that, but bizarrely they sent down one of their top executives to the UK parliament. were under oath, he once again stated two things that were blatantly untrue. One is that she was a convicted stalker that Richard Gad had been terrorized by, and we know that that person they were talking about

was based on Fiona Harvey. And secondly, they'd done everything they could, they said, to protect the identities of the real people being found out. And yet we know from internet sleuth that literally within minutes of the series airing, people tapped into the internet or social media specific phrases from stuff that was being put on screen as being sent by the supposedly, you know, fictitious stalker

to Richard Gagg. He's playing himself to compound it. And they found the exact same phraseology on Fiona Harvey's Twitter feed, for example. So it could only have been her. So she was identified immediately. So the duty of care, it seems to me, just collapsed and was almost non-existent.

And once you assume that it's Fiona Harvey they're talking about because they're using her exact phraseology, you then move to, well, okay, they've called it a true story. What she ever convicted is they claim twice. And I interviewed the supposed first victim of this convicted stalker, Laura Ray, who was this Scottish lawyer, who was a very nice lady, who I did think had a very difficult time with Fiona.

We can come to that part of this. But she made it clear. that no, as far as she was aware, Fiona Harvey never went to prison. I never went to court over this. She got an interim edict, and after that, she didn't hear from her again. Similarly, Richard Gad at the end, the big de nuement, Fiona Harvey in tears in court, breaks down, I did it, and gets another eight and a half months in prison

to go with the previous supposed four-year centres. And again, that doesn't seem to have happened. I've got the background check here that you guys did. And there's no record of Fiona Harvey under any of the name she's ever used, ever having any criminal record. So if you put all those things together, I mean, I'm not a lawyer, but I spent a lot of time around lawyers. It does seem to me you've got a pretty open and shut case. Well, so you raise a lot of things. Number one, nobody goes to testify in front of

parliament without being thoroughly prepared. Think about it. There are teams of lawyers that are going to sit there and ask the questions, get the information, because he knows what it's being asked. So it's so irresponsible for him to testify under oath in front of parliament saying she was convicted when it's clear she wasn't. That's the first thing. The second thing you raise is that, you know, you said the word internet slews. I think that's sort of a loose term. I could get it on the internet. You'd have to be a sleuth.

That's what I mean. Anyone. No, no, I know you met. My point is it was very easy for anyone and everyone. And in fact, your guy, John Dingwall, who was on one of your prior episodes, said I just Googled the real name of Martha. So it really was a very simple thing to find out. In today's day and age, you have to make sure you don't make her Scottish, make her look different, use different tweets, use different Facebook pages. And so it was really a response to them to do that.

And that's a second thing you raise. And you're right. It's remarkable that Netflix, one of the largest corporations in the world, and the leader, if not one of the leaders of streaming, would literally, put this on their cover page and say this is true. To me, it's extremely, it's very, very, very strong. The Sunday Times over in the UK reported at the weekend that they had a source who said Richard Gab was against calling it a true story, but Netflix insisted it needed to be. How significant could that be if that turns out to be true? Well, that even, it's actually great news for me. I heard about that story this weekend and think about it. If it's, it's,

One thing if Richard Gadd says to them, it's true, it's true or true, and they fail to do their due diligence. It's even worse is if Richard Gad says, well, I don't really want this to be a true story. And Netflix says, no, no, no, no, we want it to be true. The information they get from the person who actually, and the other thing is he wrote it, he started it, right? The information they get is this isn't true. And they say, we don't want to listen to you. We're making it a true story. I mean, we're going beyond, this is far worse than negligence.

This is intentional misconduct. If they actually were told, don't make it a true story, and they said it were true. The other part of is quite interesting to me, which I've been saying a lot actually on my show. Point 25 of your lawsuit says, GAD is a self-admitted crack, meth, and heroin user with a self-emitted history of masturbating to Fiona Harvey, following her home and spying on her through her window. And I've made this point, really, that by his own... of mission, Richard Gad is a very damaged individual who did a lot of, you know, pretty damaging stuff to himself and to others. And that, that, I guess, points to his reliability in all this,

not least if he ends up under oath in a courtroom. Yeah, I mean, the guy, he has no credibility. He has no credibility at all. And what he put in that story about himself is really, it bothers some, all the issues about being raped and going back to the guy, everything he has in there. And he's claiming that's all true. So the man, the person they most rely on for the truth of the story has been shattered before I even get to cross-examine him.

You know what it struck me? I mean, I've got no basis for knowing this to be true. But just looking at the trajectory of all this, Richard Gad definitely goes through some experience with Fiona Harvey. They both go through some experience. My view of it has always been they were both pretty damaged. people when it was going on, whatever it was. And he then does this show up in Edinburgh on stage, and it starts to get real traction

and popularity. And he's desperate to make it as a comedian, having been very unsuccessful. And then Netflix hear about it, and it all kind of goes to his head. And he gets to star on his own dramatization of his own show. He gets to be all over. He gets to write it. For him, coming from where he's come from, this is a fantastic opportunity. And potentially, you can make him very rich.

So that's that kind of temptation, if you like, to bend a few of the rules. And the reason I say that, he told Vanity Fair, I would say the broad strokes are very much true. But he admitted to tweaking the timeline and changing some details of the story. And this plays, I think, Richard, too, this kind of modern-day thing of the truth doesn't matter. It's my truth that matters. Well, actually, I don't think courtrooms really recognize my truth very much. They tend to stick to what they view as incontrovertible, provable facts. And that is where I think if this does end up in court,

particularly with a jury trial, that they could really come unstuck. You're absolutely right. And that was one of my three reasons. The first question you asked me, what is truth? And what's interesting, and you pointed it out, Pierce, I give you credit for it because you put it up before I even noticed it, is that when Netflix came back, they didn't say, they didn't say we stand by the story being true.

they say we stand by Richard Gadd telling his story. Well, that's very different than saying it's true. So we have Richard Gad who's running from the facts of the series, and we have Netflix running from the facts of the series, and they're doing so because there's so much in there that are just fabricated. And when you talk about truth and fake news and what, you know, we live in this whole world where we hear it and we believe it. And when you read it, when you hear this and you believe this a true story,

you have an obligation as I don't care if you're a network, I don't care for your newscaster, I don't care for you're a streamer, to be honest. They didn't say it was based on a true story. They didn't say it was inspired by a true story. They said this is a true story. And you know what? If it's not, then they have to be held accountable.

This is a more difficult question. But when I interviewed Fiona Harvey, I mean, she wasn't the most sympathetic interview I've ever come across, right? She's quite abrasive. She's quite combative. And talking to Laura Ray, who was the Scottish lawyer that she certainly, I would say that she harassed her quite badly and certainly behaved badly towards her. Does any of that matter? I mean, does it matter what Fiona Harvey may have been like in terms of trolling people, maybe even harassing people? If he doesn't cross a line of criminal behaviour, if a network like Netflix in this, this show under the title, True Story, says you are a convicted stalker.

Does any of what Fiona Harvey may have done that doesn't cross that line matter? So here's what matters. And you press, Laura Ray, I actually watched that interview as well. You pressed her on whether or not the conduct that Fiona engaged in was criminal. And she said it wasn't. You have to actually physically hit someone to be criminal. And you even asked her, have the laws changed? It would it be criminal today, even though this was 22 years ago?

And she said, no, it never was criminal. I never filed a criminal complaint. And yet Netflix has on its story, while Richard Gatt is doing his due diligence, his research, that she was in jail for four and a half years. And even Laura Ray said, you wouldn't be in jail for anywhere near that amount of time. So that's what becomes relevant. The fact that there was something happened with 22 years ago with Laura Ray and Fiona, I don't really care about that.

But what I care about is that Netflix and Gad represented that she was twice convicted, once before and once during the show. But while he's doing his investigation, he says she was a criminal from four and a half years. And Laura Ray said, none of that is true. And even Laura Ray thought that was irresponsible. I'm curious about your decision to do this in California. For example, if you did it in England,

I know this when I used to run newspapers here, the libel laws here are much tougher. You know, you would have probably had an easier legal battle here, I would argue, than in America. Why are the choice of venue of California and why this gigantic figure that you've come up with of $175 million? So the reason, two questions. I'll give me the answer to both. The reason why California is because we don't want to engage in all kinds of procedural motions by Netflix.

We've seen lawsuits against Netflix. We've seen them against Hulu. They will move for form non-convenience. They'll move for wrong jurisdiction. We're going right for them. They can't get out of the fact that they are domiciled in California. So we're doing way with a lot of procedural lawyer arguing and lawyer legal motions. So that's the answer to your first question. California is where they're from and they have to be responsible in California. The second question, $170 million. It is a huge number. No question about it.

But some of the causes of action in the complaint entitle Fiona to loss to the price. that Netflix obtained from this series. That's what the law provides. If they wronged her, then she isn't told to their profits. We don't know what that number is. Again, this is very early. We just filed a lawsuit. But we know that over 60 million people have viewed it.

We know that it either has or is becoming the largest show ever on Netflix. And we know that Netflix is making a tremendous money, money from it. In fact, Richard Gadd is on a U.S. tour promoting it. Yeah. Richard Gad was in New York last week and having a discussion.

He was on the Today Show in New York. He was on the Tonight Show. So they are pumping this story and they're making oodles of money from it. So we will see once we get discovery what the real profits are. Netflix says they intend to defend this matter vigorously and they stand by Gads right to tell his story.

But as he pointed out, that's not quite the same as saying we stand by this as being a true story. It's huge. I mean, to me, it's even an admission. Now, obviously, it's a public statement, but yeah, why wouldn't we've, we're already seeing a lot of divisiveness between Netflix and Gad. Gads saying he told them it wasn't true. Gads saying he bended, and then Netflix is just saying, uh-oh, we will stand behind it, that they have to deny the allegations. And we'll see where this plays out. It's going to be a very interesting path, roadmap we're on. But I will tell you that. that Netflix has unbelievable responsibility, culpability for saying at a minimum that she's a twice-time convicted felon. You saw the scene where she's crying

and she pleads guilty. That's all fabricated. Well, this is what I've been saying from the start. Listen, I don't think he's Richard Gadder. I think he's a talented guy. I thoroughly enjoyed the series, right, before I ever sat down with Fiona. But when I sat down with her,

I was struck by a number of things about her in the interview. One, she conducted herself with remarkable confidence, given she'd never done an interview of that kind in her life. Secondly, the damage to her and her privacy and everything else and the threats she'd been receiving was clear and palpable and was having a clearly palpable effect on her. But thirdly, I was really curious, when I pushed her on things like, look, Netflix, say, in the series,

they list 41,000 emails, they talk about, X number of text messages, X number of this, very, very precise. And I sort of thought, well, they would only do that, Netflix, if Richard Gaddad actually supplied them with the evidence of those numbers of things. Do you have any knowledge yet from Fiona's side, as she could show knew anything,

which either supports that those numbers are correct or actually contradict them? We've seen nothing near 41,000 emails. And as Fiona said, think of how long it would take to write 41,000 emails. So we will get it in discovery. We don't have it yet, nor do we believe it exists. But to your other point, you know, this is a woman who was really thrust into the limelight.

This is not a situation where you have a public figure who essentially was defamed. This situation where a woman lives her own life and she all of a sudden found getting death threats, can't leave her apartment, really, really just inappropriate. Why is Netflix not calling her up and saying, listen, we're about to do this story. We'd like you to look at it. We'd like the fact check. I mean, my God, Pierce, that's all you do is fact check all day. You know what the laws are.

And it's terrible. And you saw how nervous she was on there. She's also a very bright woman. She has her legal degree. She's very bright. She was very nervous. She didn't personally, she was thrust into the limelight, which is unfortunate. But she stood her ground, and I will.

To your credit, you're not an easy cross-examiner. And so it was not easy for her. And she's very nervous, destroyed, tattered from this. The show's end credits, as some people have pointed out. Say the program is based on real events, how the certain characters, names, incidents, locations, and dialogue have been fictionalized for dramatic purposes. Does that make any difference if at the start you've said this is a true story?

My answer is good luck with that. I mean, that's a disclaimer, which after you've seen the whole thing. To us, it doesn't make any difference. They don't, you know, they put it at the end when people are ready to go to watch another series. They make it very clear from the inception of this story, that it's a true story. And the reason why it got such big attention is because it's a crazy story to be true. So if Netflix is the one pushing for the true story lingo up front, then at the end, the argument that we have this little disclaimer at the end that it could be fictionalized

means nothing to me. I mean, this may or may not come to court. We'll have to wait and see how Netflix conduct themselves. But what is the onus in California? Is it on you to prove these allegations are untrue or is it on Netflix to prove that they are true? It's had Netflix to prove that they are true. We are, she's not a public figure, and there's two different. If you're a public figure, it's easier under the anti-SLAPP statutes for the press to win the case.

But when you're this person who sits in your own apartment and all of a sudden you've been thrusted in the limelight, they're going to have to show. They're going to have to show that they have the facts to support. They're claiming, quite frankly, I don't know how they're going to do it. She wasn't convicted once. She wasn't convicted twice. Are there 41,000 emails? Was she, you know, did what did she do? all the things that they allege in there.

We have several facts in the complaint, and it's detailed for a reason, listed, which say this didn't happen, this didn't happen, this didn't happen, this didn't happen, this didn't happen, this didn't happen. Let's see what Netflix comes back with, because right now we're hearing a little sort of dance going on that we believe he should tell his story,

Gad retracting himself. So yes, it's their obligation to tell us that if they wrote a story, it better darn well be true. Have you been talking regularly to Fiona? throughout this process? Yes. I speak to her regularly, yes. And how is she doing? I mean, honestly, she's not well. She's clamped up on her apartment. She doesn't know what to do, doesn't know where to go. She's hurting. I mean, she really has been shattered by this.

The people, you know, there's going to be a big, a lot of the, a big percentage of the populace that don't believe her and think she is, Martha, who's depicted in that in the series. And so she's afraid to go out and get groceries. It's that bad. Well, I appreciate it that coming on censored. I appreciate you coming on Unsensitive. I'm going to be following this with great interest because I think it's a fascinating case.

My final question, there are massive wider implications to this. There was a case at the weekend, Steve Coogan and a project he was involved in, now moving forward in a defamation case where they identified somebody. Do you think this is going to be potentially a tipping point for the entertainment industry? I think it should be. It's very easy to say this is inspired by a true story. This is based on a true story. I think it should be.

We live in a world of fake news, and if this is fake, then they should be held accountable. I guarantee you that the next time Hulu, Max, you name it, Paramount Plus, Netflix, etc., even YouTube TV, does a story and they claim it to be true. There's going to be a ton of lawyers who are going through the facts to make sure that they're right. And I'm very curious to see what Netflix did here to confirm the veracity of what they say is a true story. You know, all they had to do is what they did with the Crown. Just say, you know, they didn't say with the Crown, this is a true story. They made it clear that they changed stuff. And that's what you have to do.

And what compounds is it is such a vile story. I mean, the acts in there are horrific. Yeah. And to attribute a woman who's never had any. never been in the limelight and has never been had any to face the press on this, yeah, this could be a watershed moment for streaming TV. And just finally, sorry, if it does go to court in California, will Fiona give evidence, will she testify?

Oh, she'll certainly give evidence. We'll have Richard Gad testify. We'll have her testify. We're going to have a string of people at Netflix testifying as to what they did, why they agreed to the language in the front, what they did to check it. I also can't wait to find out how how King, whatever's name was,

was prepared in front of Parliament, who testified in part of Parliament? My goodness, I mean, that's not a blunder. That is real, real inappropriate conduct. Well, he's, we've already had members of Parliament asking that Netflix come back and respond. Following the revelations it came after, it was a Netflix executive called Benjamin King.

It was giving evidence at Westminster's Culture Media Sport Committee in Parliament under oath. If he's misled parliament, that's a pretty serious offence in this country. And it could have, again, big repercussions for Netflix corporately. And big repercussions for my lawsuit. Honestly, if he goes and goes to parliament and says I lied or I was wrong or I misspoke, that's very problematic for Netflix. Richard Roth, great to see.

Apparently, I did meet you at the finale of Celebrity Apprentice in 2008 when I won it. You were there, apparently. I was at the finale. I have a very good dear friend Carol Alt who was one of the... Oh, I love Carol. One of my fellow contestants. I believe we met back then. I told your producer I didn't want to say...

I don't want to say that because I don't want to... I mean, you are in your own right very well known. But yes, I was at the finale of The Apprentice, but you won. And congratulations how many years later? Well, who would have known that the guy who made me a celebrity apprentice would then become president of the United States? It's a funny old world. That's a very different conversation.

Richard Roth, thank you very much. Thank you, Pierce.