TV Dramatization of a Real-Life Crime

For the record, please note that of the $200,000 “coughed up” by NBC and ITC Productions to “gain permissions to portray certain characters in ‘The Billionaire Boys Club,’ ” not one penny was paid to Joe Hunt (“Murder Most Glamorized,” April 2).

Mr. Hunt refused to grant NBC-ITC permission to make or broadcast its fictional “docudrama” and has filed suit against both network and producers for libel and slander.

In his letter of April 16, producer Harvey Kahn spoke eloquently of the “underlying reasons a producer might have for retelling events involved in murder.” Mr. Kahn listed “social, historical or psychological factors,” but omitted the crucial factor apparently motivating NBC-ITC: greed.

When NBC broadcast its “Billionaire Boys Club,” several members of that group were then in trial, and no court had tried Hunt on the Eslaminia murder charge. That “historical” factor did not preclude NBC-ITC from broadcasting its fiction film portraying Hunt and other unconvicted parties as guilty of committing a crime.

EILEEN McGARRY and JEFFREY L. MELCZER

Attorneys for Joe Hunt

Dummit, Faber & Brown

Los Angeles