Crime and entertainment don’t only meet on TV. In real life, they also intersect when the crime is the story and when either criminals or victims are entertainment clients. This two part CLE course will focus on issues encountered by producers and filmmakers when their product, whether it be a TV show, movie, theatre production or podcast, focuses on a crime story.

The course will cover true crime stories and fictional ones and the many legal issues that may arise such as life story rights, First Amendment rights, option contracts, publicity rights, news-worthiness, compensation for misdeeds, and more. The second part of the course will relate to criminal issues that arise when clients are either victims or defendants such as in cases of sexual assault and harassment, the use of song lyrics as evidence, images and gang violence, fair trials for public figures, identity theft, festival frauds and more.