05.26.09 ‘CSI’ WRITER SUED FOR DEFAMATION

Real estate agents Scott and Melinda Tamkin (pictured) are suing “CSI” writer Sarah Goldfinger and CBS for $6 million, claiming that the hit show defamed them when an episode that aired in February featured an S&M-loving realtor couple named… Scott and Melinda Tamkin.  Uh oh.

In “Deep Fried and Minty Fresh,” an episode that aired in February, the characters in question — mysteriously deceased Melinda and her husband and suspected killer Scott — are referred to as the Tuckers. But the suit contends that the surname was Tamkin in the original script and that Tamkin was used in casting calls and in synopses of the episode later posted widely online on “spoiler” sites and other pages.

A lawyer for the Tamkins, who live in Westwood with their three children, wrote in the suit that the “eleventh hour” name change was “for all intents and purposes an admission that [Goldfinger] had stepped over the line.” The suit alleges that even after the switch, Goldfinger, who was also a producer on the episode, helped choose actors who resembled the Tamkins for the roles. [LA Times]

Wow, this is a tough one for the jury of me.  On the one hand, I can’t stand CBS and its lineup of unoriginal procedural crime dramas.  On the other, every realtor on the planet deserves death by sodomy with a halberd.  So I guess I’ll be rooting for a courtroom bombing.  Again.