Law & Crime founder Abrams on Court TV relaunch: ‘No value to a modern audience’

Former Court TV reporter and Law & Crime founder Dan Abrams said Court TV’s upcoming relaunch “has no value to a modern audience.”

“We always anticipated that after seeing our success re-inventing the old Court TV for the new mulitplatform era with Law&Crime Network, that others would try to imitate our model,” Abrams said in a statement provided to The Hill on Tuesday, one day ahead of Court TV’s relaunch.

{mosads}”It seems they spent big money for an outdated name that we actually passed on. Despite my nostalgia, it really has no value to a modern audience.”

Abrams is currently the chief legal analyst for ABC News in addition to running Abrams Media, which includes Mediaite, which covers and analyzes media, and Law & Crime, a daily live trial coverage channel that includes in-studio analysis of the notable crime and legal stories, an investigative news show and a daily wrap show.

Court TV CEO Jonathan Katz told The Hill in response to Abrams that his channel is unmatched in experience, “brand recognition and the polish” while expressing confidence the channel “will be very successful.”

“There is no significant other player in the space with the scale, the resources, the experience, the brand recognition and the polish that the new Court TV will bring to the country,” Katz said in a statement. “For these reasons and many others, we are confident Court TV will be very successful and we can’t wait for people to see it.”

Court TV is being relaunched as a 24-hour channel that will focus on crimes and trials. It was originally launched in 1991.

The previous version enjoyed rating success, particularly leading up to and during the O.J. Simpson and Casey Anthony trials, but was eventually converted to truTV in 2008. 

Katz also says it has acquired the intellectual property of the original Court TV, which includes 100,000 hours of the Court TV library. 

–Updated at 12:30 p.m.