Mike Carlton accuses the late Stan Zemanek of fraud

BUT GETS IT WRONG: Comment from Peter Saxon. Lucky for Mike Carlton that Stan Zamanek is dead. Otherwise it is likely he’d sue for defamation.

In his Saturday column in the SMH, Carlton dropped the bombshell: Zemanek had defrauded 2UE of more than $200,000 in advertising revenue. It was money he owed the station for the sale of commercials in his show but had never paid.

The comment was near the end of an article that was ostensibly the last word in a stoush that had been running all week in the Fairfax and News Ltd Press between long time foes Ray Hadley, in the News corner, and Mike Carlton, aligned with Fairfax.

First it was Carlton who was furious that the ABC’s Australian Story had interviewed him for a show about Hadley but cut out all his negative comments (which was pretty much the whole interview) and ended up doing a puff piece on Hadley. 

Australian Story defended its stance by pointing out that its job is to feature their subjects’ point of view and it does positive pieces on everyone. For hard criticism, Carlton would be best advised to watch, say, Four Corners.

Hadley then hit back at Carlton saying that he too had negative things to say about people, but the Australian Story producers cut them out too.

Hadley told News his comments about Carlton centred on his attack on Stan Zemanek, following his death from brain cancer in 2007. “Good taste dictates you don’t speak ill of the dead,” Mr Hadley said. “His bad taste knows no bounds.”

Less than two hours before the funeral Carlton told his 2UE listeners that, ‘the only reason he’d go to the funeral was to make sure Zamanek was dead.’

I made the comment on radioinfo at the time that, as much as I am a big fan of Carlton’s work, it was a despicable thing to say. Even though it was well known the two were mortal enemies, the timing was appalling.

Then on Saturday, Carlton used his regular column in the SMH to lambast both Hadley and the long deceased Zemanek. 

The Hadley stuff was old news to most. We know about his temper and yes, he favours those politicians Carlton mostly doesn’t like and rails against those that Carlton does like. What a surprise.

What was news, was this revalation from Carlton, “At the time I was also one of the few people aware of a well-kept secret: that Zemanek had defrauded 2UE of more than $200,000 in advertising revenue. It was money he owed the station for the sale of commercials in his show but had never paid. 2UE was about to take legal action to get it when he contracted the cancer that killed him. So the station backed off and dropped the case, not wanting to further upset his bereaved family.”

A reliable source, who does not wish to be named, but was close to the situation at the time, says that while there is an element of truth to Carlton’s version of events, there was never a suggestion that Zamanek was defrauding 2UE.

The source told me that Stan had a company called Metro Media which pumped a significant amount of money through, not just 2UE, but the whole of the Fairfax network. As Stan became more and more ill, it was clear that both his on air work and the running of Metro Media had become compromised.

It was true that three of the Fairfax stations were owed money by Metro Media. When it became evident that Zemanek was gravely ill, Fairfax decided to collect the money directly from the clients involved and most of it was successfully recovered.

To verify this story, I rang former Fairfax network GM, Graham Mott who would neither confirm nor deny this version of events, but did say, “You have very good sources.”

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 Peter Saxon