Rod Wheeler, the private investigator who was hired by trump supporter Ed Butowsky to make an analysis of the murdered Democratic National Committee staffer Seth Rich, filed a federal lawsuit in the Southern District of New York on Tuesday.
According to the lawsuit, Malia Zimmerman of Fox News made up two quotes which credited Wheeler in an article published on May 16. The alleged fake news claimed that Rich was murdered for providing Wikileaks with sensitive DNC emails.
Wheeler alleges that Fox created this misinformation in favor of Trump to take the attention away from the ongoing Russia investigation, which is speculated to have had a role in Trump’s winning the presidency.
In addition, Wheeler also filed a lawsuit against Fox for discrimination due to his African-American race. He will be represented by Douglas Wigdor, the same lawyer representing several former Fox News employees, who are claiming that the news network tolerates sexual harassment in the office and other work-related issues including discrimination.
Fox News denies allegations by Wheeler
Jay Wallace, president of news at Fox, released a statement, “The accusation that Fox News published Malia Zimmerman’s story to help detract from coverage of the Russia collusion issue is completely erroneous.” He also added that the news network vehemently denies the claims of discrimination by Wheeler.
The May 16 article of Zimmerman was eventually withdrawn by Fox after a week of its publication, after which Wheeler corrected the wrong information, subsequently damaging his credibility in the process.
Wheeler claims that he and Butowsky met with Sean Spicer, a former White House spokesman, on April 20 and gave him notes of all the information he had gathered regarding the case up to that point.
White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said on Tuesday that the administration was in no way involved with Fox News' story regarding Rich’s death.
The killing of Seth Rich
Rich was killed in July 2016 in what police in Washington D.C. believed to be a failed robbery. Butowsky, a contributor at Fox News, has convinced the Rich family to hire Wheeler to investigate the murder of their 27-year-old son. Butowsky even offered to pay for the expenses, according to reports.
The Rich family agreed to hire the private investigator. However, Zimmerman’s article was published, which said that Wheeler believes there was evidence that connects Rich to Wikileaks before he was murdered, prompting a quick rebuke from Rich’s family.
