Legal Eagles Attack Each Other’s Ads : Television: Attorney and Legal Rights Defenders fight over truthfulness of his personal injury commercials.

A dispute over those daytime TV ads aimed at victims of traffic accidents has prompted two local legal services to take time out from their solicitations of the bloodied and the whiplashed to attack each other.

The problem began earlier this week when KTTV Channel 11 and KCBS Channel 2 pulled off the air an ad purchased by David L. Ganezer, a personal injury attorney in Santa Monica, in which he made the claim that another prominent TV advertiser, Legal Rights Defenders, is not an actual law firm but a middleman that, for a fee, refers callers to attorneys. The ad suggests that victims can save money by calling Ganezer instead.

Ganezer claims that KTTV rejected his ad after airing it twice because Legal Rights Defenders, a company that spent more than $1.6 million last year in local TV advertising, “used economic blackmail” to induce KTTV to reject his ads.

Ganezer said he gave KTTV a cashier’s check for $6,800 to cover the cost of 10 one-minute spots. He said he will pursue a breach-of-contract lawsuit if it does not air his ad eight more times.

A KTTV spokeswoman said that the commercial was discontinued because “it did not comply with the station’s broadcast standards.” She added that the spot aired initially because the station did not have time to review it. She admitted that the Legal Rights Defenders had called the station to object to Ganezer’s spots, “but our decision would still be the same no matter who brought it to our attention.”

KCBS similarly pulled Ganezer’s ad after airing it about 30 times. Sandra Williams, deputy West Coast counsel for CBS, said the station stopped airing the ad after Legal Rights Defenders provided information that called into question two of Ganezer’s negative remarks about the company.

Williams said the station requires substantiation of all claims contained in any comparative ad. Before Ganezer’s spot aired, she said, Ganezer had provided enough information to satisfy KCBS that his claims were true. Following the airing of the spots, Williams said, “Legal Rights Defenders complained about specific statements which they believed to be inaccurate at worst or misleading at best. They provided us with some information and we decided that the claims were misleading. If Mr. Ganezer can modify the spots so that any assertion can be substantiated, then we will accept the ad.”

Williams insisted that the decision to pull the ad was based solely on Ganezer’s failure to substantiate all claims. Whether Legal Rights Defenders does or does not advertise on KCBS in the future is irrelevant, she said.

“It’s important to note that anyone can come to the station and dispute a commercial,” said Carol Kinsey, KCBS’ publicity director. “We did not make the decision based on the fact that the dispute is coming from Legal Rights Defenders.”

In KTTV’s case, however, Ganezer believes otherwise. In a letter accusing KTTV of breach of contract, he wrote: “KTTV is in business to provide information to the public, not provide a platform for Legal Rights Defenders and their saturation advertising. . . . They know the information is accurate. Therefore, they have used economic blackmail in a manner that casts shame on the dignity and independent reputation of KTTV.”

Both KCBS and KTTV have offered to make good on their contracts with Ganezer by airing a 30-second commercial that barely mentions Legal Rights Defenders. Ganezer has agreed to this solution with KCBS because it had fulfilled more than 80% of his contract with the 60-second spot. He said he will not accept this offer from KTTV and instead plans to resubmit a slightly modified version, with essentially the same message.

Officials from Legal Rights Defenders could not be reached for comment. Ganezer’s 60-second ad is scheduled to begin airing Monday on KNBC Channel 4.