CBS Sues Howard Stern Over Sirius

From Yahoo News:

CBS Corp.'s radio division sued Howard Stern Tuesday, claiming its former star shock jock breached his contract with them when he moved to Sirius Satellite Radio Inc.

The lawsuit, which also names Sirius and Stern's agent as defendants, claims Stern improperly used CBS radio's air time to promote his new show with Sirius, which began last month. CBS also claims Stern discussed his plans with Sirius without disclosing them to CBS as required under his contract.

Even before the lawsuit was filed in New York State Supreme Court, Stern tried to upstage the action with a hastily arranged news conference in Manhattan Tuesday to strike first at his former employer.

Stern said the lawsuit was meritless, and said CBS was trying to "bully" him. He called the lawsuit a "personal vendetta" against him by CBS Chief Executive Officer Leslie Moonves, whom Stern said held a grudge against him.

Stern said CBS officials knew of his plans to leave for Sirius and also condoned his references to satellite radio on the air and did nothing to stop him when he spoke about it on his show.

CBS Radio had formerly been known as Infinity Broadcasting, part of the Viacom Inc. conglomerate before CBS split up with Viacom at the beginning of this year.

Stern called the news conference after The New York Post's widely read gossip column Page Six published an item Tuesday saying CBS was on the verge of filing a lawsuit against him.

Stern moved his popular and bawdy morning show to satellite radio last month after years of railing against decency restrictions imposed on terrestrial radio by the Federal Communications Commission.

This looks an awful lot like a case of sour grapes. It's been known for over a year that Stern was going to satellite radio.