Real estate agents sue over 'CSI' script they say defames them

When married real estate agents Scott and Melinda Tamkin read online this spring about an episode of the hit crime drama “CSI” featuring real estate agents named Scott and Melinda Tamkin -- and a kinky-sex element -- the explanation seemed clear.

A house sale involving the Tamkins and a “CSI” producer had fallen apart four years before, and the producer was listed as the co-writer of the episode.

On Friday, the Tamkins filed a $6-million defamation and invasion-of-privacy lawsuit against the producer, Sarah Goldfinger, saying she humiliated them and cost them potential business “by creating from whole cloth characters engaged in a reckless lifestyle of sexual bondage, pornography, drunkenness, marital discord, depression, financial straits and possibly even murder.”

Also named as defendants in L.A. County Superior Court are CBS; the company that produced the episode, Jerry Bruckheimer Television; and Goldman, Sachs Capital Partners, which is identified in court papers as a partner in the production.

 A Goldman spokesman declined to comment. The other defendants did not respond to messages seeking comment.

In the episode, “Deep Fried & Minty Fresh,” which aired in February, the characters in question – mysteriously deceased Melinda and her husband and suspected killer, Scott – are referred to as the Tuckers. But the suit contends that their surname was Tamkin in the original script and that the last name was used in casting calls and in synopses of the episode later posted widely online on “spoiler” sites and other pages.

A lawyer for the Tamkins, who live in Westwood with their three children, wrote in the suit that the “eleventh hour” name change was “for all intents and purposes an admission that [Goldfinger] had stepped over the line.”

The suit alleges that even after the switch, Goldfinger, who was also a producer on the episode, helped choose actors who resembled the Tamkins for the roles. The couple contacted CBS after discovering the online episode descriptions and the network tried to remove some references, including several on pornography sites referencing kinky sex ascribed to the fictional couple, said Tamkin’s lawyer, Anthony Glassman.

The Tamkins declined through their attorney to speak about the suit. Glassman said the fact that the millions of viewers in the U.S. and abroad who have made the show an international smash never hear the name "Tamkin" was beside the point. He said the Web descriptions of the show were posted for at least five months before his clients learned of them. If a potential seller Googled their real estate company, “it’s highly unlikely they would ever have contacted them and wanted to retain them as a professional real estate agent,” he said.

“In this business, you never know why the phone doesn’t ring.” Goldfinger, who has worked on “CSI” since 2003, according to imdb.com, met the Tamkins in 2005 when they were representing the owners of a Westside house the producer wanted to buy. Goldfinger pulled out after the sale was in escrow, but according to the couple’s attorney, their business dealings with her were cordial.

 “It was just a normal interaction between potential buyer of a home and a real estate agent representing a seller,” he said.

-- Harriet Ryan

Comments

[Pat Tillman]

Desparate realtors grasping for straws.

Get a real job.

[Ray]

Who are the Tamkins?? I dont care who you are... nobody does.. I'm sure some other poor family is also saying.. "hey thats us".... who cares.. get over it and move on...

[Bill Mencken]

I don't know how long they've lived in LA, but scripts go around with all kinds of names on them until the shooting script. Then they get changed by lawyers to make sure nobody sues the show. I guess this is a great opportunity for a couple of out of work real estate agents to cash in after the boom times are over. Anybody else think their phone isn't ringing because of the economy, not some website where fictional characters with similar names appeared for one single draft of a script?

[susan iberri]

Didn't anyone read this article before posting? The producer, Goldfinger, knew these people and purposely used their entire names, as characters portrayed in a degrading way. What in the world was she thinking? She shouldn't be allowed to do this and get away with it.

[Carter]

Having worked with the Tamkins, I know firsthand that they are wonderful agents, and especially kind-hearted people. I am sorry to hear about them having to go through this experience. JUst put yourself in their position. Being an agent makes you a semi-public figure, and we are "unemployed" after every sale, which means that potential clients are constantly doing a background check, via Google. People only read the headlines, and "kinky sex" storyline on the internet turns into something that some clients may question as being based on a true experience, a "What if...". Anyhow, good luck to them.

[Sio]

After looking at the pictures of the Tamkins and the pictures of the actors over on IMDB, I'm more inclined to believe that Goldfinger actually did go to some lengths to base the characters in the show on the realtors she had run into before. Whether this was a deliberate attempt to malign them for some reason -- maybe she felt slighted during the house deal, which was why she backed out in escrow. Or maybe she is simply a lazy writer who can't make up her own characters and has to base them on real people she knows and can't be bothered to make them unrecognizable. Or it could be a total coincidence, she had a name and some faces stuck in her brain, needed a couple of warm bodies for the story, and stuffed the Tamkins in the spot because they were in her memory. Malicious, negligent, or stupid. Take your pick.

There's a saying: Never attribute to malice what can be more easily explained by stupidity. But that doesn't make it any less damaging. Just dumber.

[Robert Tamkin is going to the slam]

Bill Mencken, the poster above, almost has the story right. Here's how it REALLY goes:

sn't it interesting that about $6 million dollars is what Scott Tamkin's brother, Robert Tamkin, is going to need to keep from being charged with fraud for selling a building to a company that had encumbrances left off it's title? Robert's company, Rio Company, had sold a build in early 2009 to the Hatam Ali Family Trust for $5.2 million dollars. Now he will be forced to buy back the building and probably relocate the tenants because the building is half fallen over. It seems that the building has pipes that are busting and breaking within tenants' apartments, above tenants' cars, and everywhere in between. The water crisis was left entirely off the property's title and First Federal Bank of California had to kick in a $3.6 million dollar loan because Hatam's first loan had matured. How convenient the timing of all of this, then, that Tamkin's brother, Scott and his wife Melinda, suddenly feel that they are worth $6 million dollars. Where do you think they came up with that dollar sign? Sounds more like they're trying to keep Robert Tamkin from being charged with fraud.

Sounds fishy to me.

[Diane]

I also know the Tamkins. I worked with Bob for years. Both he and his wife are wonderful people.