Fired FX Exec Kept Listening In on Network Brass, D.A. Says

A former top television publicist was arrested Friday on a charge that he illegally eavesdropped for 2 1/2 years on confidential weekly executive staff meetings at the FX cable channel that had earlier fired him.

Los Angeles County law enforcement officials said Randolph Steven Webster, 38, faces one felony count of illegal wiretapping for using a toll-free number to dial, undetected, into meetings held by top executives at the Fox cable channel. Webster was dismissed by FX in July, 2001, in what court papers portray as a bitter falling out with a network executive Webster had once viewed as a father figure and mentor.

Webster, who for two years held the title of vice president of publicity for FX, is the brother-in-law of tennis great Pete Sampras and is married to Stella Sampras Webster, UCLA’s head women’s tennis coach.

Authorities said that as a senior FX executive, Webster had regularly participated in the meetings. Executives traveling or based outside of Los Angeles were allowed to access the meetings via conference call using a password.

But Webster continued calling in to secretly listen in on the meetings even after moving on to subsequent jobs, court records show. After leaving the News Corp.-owned FX, Webster worked as vice president for corporate communications and marketing planning at the Game Show Network owned jointly by Sony Pictures Entertainment and Liberty Digital Inc. Most recently, he was senior vice president for communications for the Universal Television Group until leaving that job this year.

It was unclear whether or how Webster might have used the information he gathered during those conference-call meetings. There also is no evidence that anyone at Game Show Network or Universal was aware of Webster’s activities, authorities said.

Still, Los Angeles County Deputy Dist. Atty. Jeffrey McGrath described Webster’s activities as a serious matter.

“I view this almost as industrial espionage,� McGrath said. “You had someone working for the competition able to get inside.�

Los Angeles lawyer Steve Meister, who represents Webster, called the executive “a longtime professional in Los Angeles with an impeccable reputation� who may have shown a lapse in conduct.

If he did, Meister said, it was because of “unusual professional circumstances� that would be disclosed at trial.

“If anything happened, it was an error in judgment without any criminal intent,� Meister said. “I think any lapse in judgment, to my knowledge, has not caused anybody any harm either professionally or financially.�

Meister said he had heard rumors that Webster sometimes leaked the information he obtained from the meetings to the news media, but said he had seen no evidence of that.

Documents seized when search warrants were served in February at Webster’s office and at his Manhattan Beach home portray a man with an intense anger toward his former boss, FX President Peter Ligouri, whom Webster once viewed as his “surrogate father.� An e-mail Webster wrote to a friend and included in court documents said: “I loved Peter like a dad ... like a brother ... you know how much that meant to me.�

But after being fired, court documents show, Webster sent numerous e-mails to FX executives criticizing Ligouri as a “cold, heartless and ruthless’� man who “killed me and got away with murder.�

A Fox Entertainment Group spokeswoman said “Peter is a highly respected Fox executive, and these rants come from a disgruntled former employee whose current felony charge speaks for itself.�

McGrath said that the breach was discovered after an anonymous tipster told FX officials last year that their conferencing system might be vulnerable. Authorities then obtained phone records from supplier MCI and found calls originating from Webster’s home, his office at Universal and from Universal offices in New York.

Webster, who could face three years in prison if he is convicted, was freed on $10,000 bond. His arraignment is scheduled for Aug. 9.