SUIT AGAINST RIVERA, SHOW DISMISSED

A federal judge dismissed a $40-million suit filed by a jai alai fronton operator against television reporter Geraldo Rivera and the ABC News program “20/20.”

Judge James Paine said Tuesday that the 1979 broadcast on corruption in the jai alai business did not intend to hurt anyone, although he suggested the program was not entirely fair.

The lawsuit, filed by Arthur Silvester Sr., president of Palm Beach Jai Alai, claimed the “20/20” program painted him as the man who started a fire that destroyed the Magnolia Park Jai Alai Fronton in 1978.

“The portion (concerning) the fire contains a series of statements which are truths, half-truths and falsities,” Paine wrote in his decision. “Considered together, a viewer might well understand these statements to mean that (Silvester) had participated in various crimes, such as arson and burning to defraud.”

Rivera, who no longer works for ABC, also is the subject of a $30-million lawsuit filed Monday by a woman he identified as a prostitute and drug dealer during a drug arrest shown live during a national television program hosted by Rivera.

Terry Rouse, 28, cleared of all criminal charges after her arrest on TV, said in the suit that the Dec. 2 broadcast of “American Vice: The Doping of a Nation” hurt her reputation, subjected her to libel and slander and prompted her false imprisonment.