The legal matters regarding The Little Couple spurred in June 2016 when the show's producers LMNO Cable Group sued Discovery Communications for $7 million.
The production accused Discovery of falsifying account records to hide hundreds of thousands of dollars. LMNO also claimed that the channel stole the show and put them out of business.
Despite the accounting scandal, the parties settled on an agreement. However, the battle was still far from over. This time, the lead stars intervened in the case.
In May 2017, they filed a case demanding contingent compensation upon word of inflated expenses and other falsified accounting documents.
As per their petition, the husband-wife duo felt entitled to a portion of both LMNO’s contingent compensation and Discovery’s adjusted gross revenues.
They accused LMNO of fraud, breach of contract, unfair competition, conversion, and more.
The duo also added that they feared losing valuable monetary and intellectual property rights, which would be adjudicated without their interests being represented.
Three years after their first step, a California federal judge rejected their fraud and conversion claims.
They lost their battle to reclaim intellectual property rights after the judge ruled they failed to pinpoint whether they were fraudulently induced into the contract.
As the court ordered the lawsuit to be dismissed through mediation and settlement, the couple and the production negotiated in July 2020.
