THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, July 30, 1994 TAG: 9407300186
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARC DAVIS, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium: 51 lines
One week after Home Box Office sued three restaurant/bars and a pool hall for cable-TV piracy, HBO admitted Friday that it had falsely accused one of the bars.
Attorneys for HBO conceded that the Azalea Inn II, a Pembroke bar and restaurant, did receive a 1993 title-fight broadcast by accident and did not steal the signal.
But the lawyers also said that charges against three other businesses will remain, even though two of those businesses have raised the same defense as the Azalea Inn II.
``The defense is legitimate'' for the Azalea Inn II, said HBO's attorney, Jeremy D. Margolis of Chicago. ``With the others, if they have some proof, we'd love to see it.''
Margolis said HBO will dismiss the Azalea Inn II from the lawsuit, which was filed July 22 in Norfolk's federal court. It seeks up to $260,000 in damages from each business for illegally showing a March 6, 1993, title fight between local hero Pernell ``Sweetpea'' Whitaker and James ``Buddy'' McGirt.
Harold Owens, owner of the Azalea Inn II, said he was pleased by HBO's admission but said it came too late to save him from embarrassment. He said Cox Cable's security chief had cleared his business of wrongdoing in April 1993, but that clearance may not have reached HBO's lawyers.
``None of this should have happened,'' Owens said. ``We should have been cleared a year ago.''
Margolis, the HBO lawyer, said tests of the Azalea Inn's cable system showed a faulty trap box, which should have prevented the bar from receiving the fight. Instead, the business received a partial signal, sometimes with poor picture, sometimes with poor sound.
``They really didn't do anything wrong,'' said Gregory A. Giordano, an HBO attorney in Virginia Beach.
HBO is accusing three other Virginia Beach businesses - The River House, the Reef Lounge and Bay Billiards - of illegally receiving the 1993 fight broadcast. Two of those businesses, the Reef Lounge and Bay Billiards, tell stories almost identical to the Azalea Inn II's: that they got the broadcast by accident.
But HBO said the lawsuit against those businesses will remain. ``We have evidence that the circumstances with the other three were not the same'' as with the Azalea Inn II, Giordano said Friday.
KEYWORDS: LAWSUIT HBO HOME BOX OFFICE by CNB