Cable Firm Names Mayor, Aides in Conspiracy Suit

A Los Angeles cable company filed a lawsuit Friday accusing Mayor Tom Bradley and several top aides of unlawfully conspiring to prevent the company from offering cable television service in South-Central Los Angeles.

The suit alleged that the mayor and nine other city officials intentionally violated the 1st Amendment rights of Preferred Communications Inc. to maintain control over cable television in Los Angeles.

For more than six years Preferred has fought for the right, recently upheld in U.S. District Court, to break the monopoly on the South Central franchise currently held by Continental Cable Co.

“A small clique of city officials is conspiring to prevent Preferred from ever succeeding in breaking the cable monopoly which they created,” said attorney Harold Farrow, who filed the suit in Superior Court.

Bradley spokesman Bill Chandler responded, “This is simply another in a series of failed attempts by a disgruntled bidder to hold the city and its residents hostage until their private gain is secured.”