On Thursday, an appeals court ruled in favor of comedian Sacha Baron Cohen and rejected Roy Moore’s lawsuit against him. Moore sought $95 million and claimed Baron Cohen tricked him into appearing on his Showtime series Who Is America? in a segment that referenced allegations of sexual assault and pedophilia made against the former Senate candidate.
Moore had appealed a ruling by a lower court that was also in favor of Baron Cohen. The most recent decision comes from the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan, which agreed that Moore’s claims were not sound as he had signed an agreement that prohibited legal claims against the show.
It was also determined that the show’s use of a fake prop they called a “pedophile detector” that made a sound near the politician was “clearly comedy” and did not constitute a real accusation. The ruling read in part that Baron Cohen may have indicated that he believes Moore’s many accusers, but “did not imply the existence of any independent factual basis for that belief besides the obviously farcical pedophile detecting ‘device.'”
Baron Cohen interviewed Moore in disguise as one of his many bizarre original characters. In the segment he was “Col. Erran Morad,” a phony Israeli counter-terrorism expert who quickly derailed the interview by talking about nonexistent military technology in development.
He pulled out a wand of the detector which he said detects unique enzymes that sex offenders “excrete.” He waved the wand around himself, causing no sound, and then put it over Moore, where it beeped. Baron Cohen feigned a confused reaction and asked Moore “Is this your jacket?” Moore snapped back that “maybe Israeli technology hasn’t developed properly,” and quickly cuts off the interview afterward.
Moore attempted to argue the waiver he signed for the show was unenforceable because of the pretenses he signed it under, which was reportedly to receive an award for supporting Israel. It was ruled that the agreement was still binding despite the misdirection employed by Baron Cohen and the show’s producers.
Baron Cohen is a notorious prankster that still manages to trick people to this day despite his long career doing it. He even tanked the career of Georgia Representative Jason Spencer in another episode of the very same show.
Moore has indicated that he still plans to appeal.
