ESPN Has Been Forced To Return 37 Emmy’s After Being Caught Using Fake Names To Win The Awards.
ESPN returned dozens of Emmy statues and “disciplined” employees after an investigation disclosed Thursday found that the sports network had submitted fake names to the awards organization in a bid to secure trophies for on-air personalities who had been ineligible to receive them.
The apparent fraud stretched back to 1997, ESPN said in a statement, acknowledging that members of its team “were clearly wrong” for concocting the scheme.
“Some members of our team were clearly wrong in submitting certain names that may go back to 1997 in Emmy categories where they were not eligible for recognition or statuettes,” an ESPN spokesperson said in a statement.
.“This was a misguided attempt to recognize on-air individuals who were important members of our production team.
Once current leadership was made aware, we apologized to NATAS for violating guidelines and worked closely with them to completely overhaul our submission process to safeguard against anything like this happening again.”
The Athletic, which broke the story on the scheme Thursday, reported that over the years when ESPN was given the prestigious awards using the fictitious names, the broadcaster had them re-engraved and then handed them out to the personalities who had been ineligible to receive them.
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