LOS ANGELES—An arbitrator has ordered 21st Century Fox to pay $179 million in a dispute over profits with the stars of the long-running TV show “Bones,” saying Fox executives engaged in “intentional fraud and malice.”
The decision was reached earlier this month and revealed in a court petition from the plaintiffs Wednesday demanding that Fox pay, a decision Fox said it would contest.
Arbitrator Peter Licthman, a retired Los Angeles Superior Court judge, rebuked top Fox executives by name for self-dealing and deceit and his decision includes $128 million in punitive damages, calling the sum “reasonable and necessary to punish Fox for its reprehensible conduct and deter it from future wrongful conduct.”
