NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

Selleck accused of stealing water for ranch

LOS ANGELES

A water district has sued Tom Selleck, claiming the star of the crime shows “Magnum, P.I.” and “Blue Bloods” stole truckloads of water from a public hydrant and took it to his ranch in drought-stricken California.

The Calleguas Municipal Water District in Ventura County claims a tanker truck filled up at a hydrant more than a dozen times and hauled water to a 60-acre ranch owned by Selleck in Westlake Village.

The Los Angeles Times says Selleck grows avocados at the ranch.

The district also says it spent nearly $22,000 to hire a private investigator to document the purported thefts that date back two years.

The Ventura County Sheriff’s Department also investigated and was unable to establish that a crime occurred, Capt. John Reilly said.

Representatives for Selleck did not return phone messages and emails seeking comment Wednesday. The lawsuit also names his wife, Jillie Selleck.

The lawsuit was filed June 30 after California communities were ordered to cut water use by 25 percent compared with 2013 levels due to the relentless, four-year drought.

The area in Ventura County where Selleck has his land is under mandatory cutbacks as high as 36 percent from 2013.

Rerun season isn’t so repeatable

NEW YORK

One thing in shorter supply during what always has been known as broadcast television’s rerun season is reruns.

Of the 100 most-watched prime-time programs on broadcast networks last week, one-third were repeats, according to the Nielsen company. The Fourth of July week would be considered the height of summer rerun season, as it is traditionally the least-watched week of television in a calendar year, or close to it.

The 33 reruns include a handful of immediate repeats, with episodes of shows such as CBS’ “Extant” or NBC’s “America’s Got Talent” that ran originally only days earlier. CBS also had the most- popular scripted original series of the week with the premiere of “Zoo.”

The more-traditional CBS had 16 of the 33 reruns, including popular shows “NCIS” and “The Big Bang Theory” that finished in the Nielsen company’s top 10 for the week. ABC was next with 10.

Fox scored a rare win in the weekly prime-time ratings, led by its coverage of Sunday’s women’s World Cup soccer final where the U.S. beat Japan. (The game isn’t on Nielsen’s list of top individual programs since coverage began before prime time).

For the week, Fox averaged 6.7 million viewers, CBS had 5 million, NBC had 4.7 million, ABC had 3.5 million, Univision had 2.1 million, Telemundo had 1.4 million, ION Television had 1 million and the CW had 730,000.

Associated Press