Dr. Phil Pays Big In Settlement with O.J. Simpson Witness Thomas Riccio

Busted written by Thomas Riccio

Thomas Riccio,  the former witness in the O.J. Simpson Las Vegas robbery case , has agreed to a settlement in his lawsuit against Dr. Phil a.k.a. Phil McGraw which was scheduled for trial in December.

Riccio, who jurors stated his recordings were the sole reason Simpson is serving a nine to thirty-three year sentence, sold his recordings for big bucks to gossip sight TMZ, and now once again, he has come up big through this victorious settlement with Dr. Phil and his production company, Stage 29.

Riccio sued McGraw in October for fraud and defamation after he appeared on his nationally syndicated “Dr Phil Show”.  Riccio claimed that Dr. Phil and his production company edited pieces of the interview out of context while falsely claiming that he “set O.J. Simpson up and told people to bring guns in the room”, insisting his denials were cut from the final interview and instead replaced with footage of him nodding, and appearing to agree with the host.  McGraw also made false statements attributed to Riccio’s book “Busted” and even questioned the fact that Riccio wrote his own book.

Riccio claimed that his lawyer, Stanley Leiber – The same Stanley Leiber who  got Riccio immunity in the O.J. Simpson case – informed Riccio of his settlement offer from Dr. Phil and advised him to take it.

In a statement Riccio claims that this case was not about the money.  “I’ve repeatedly asked them over and over to just admit publicly that what  they have done was wrong, and I would drop the charges, – but Dr. Phil and his people refused to admit it publicly, so instead I accepted the $80,000 to pay the legal bills and we believe that this settlement is  the same as eighty thousand apologies!” said Riccio.

“I know Dr. Phil has the money to keep litigating all his wrong doings, but unfortunately I don’t have the same financial resources, so I took the settlement.  I’ve been told that there are many other cases against Dr. Phil for these same issues, I just hope that they have the resources to continue on to trial and expose Phil and his company for the frauds they are!” Riccio said.

Dr. Phil McGraw and his representatives were not available for comment.