NEW YORK, Oct. 13 (UPI) -- Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly Wednesday filed a lawsuit against a New York lawyer and his law firm, alleging an attempt to extort $60 million from him.
A Fox News release said O'Reilly, host of The O'Reilly Factor, named Benedict P. Morelli and his law firm, Morelli & Associates in the suit.
The suit alleged Morelli and a Fox News employee threatened to sue O'Reilly and Fox News, claiming O'Reilly allegedly engaged in offensive conversations with the employee.
The employee worked for O'Reilly for four years before moving to CNN earlier this year, the news release said.
After five months at CNN, the employee asked O'Reilly to return to Fox News, and did so in July of this year, it said.
The complaint alleged Morelli and the employee engaged in an extortion attempt by threatening to file a well-publicized lawsuit and demanding an exorbitant financial settlement for hush money.
O'Reilly is seeking unspecified damages but promised to donate "100 percent" of the monetary damages to charity.
