filed for bankruptcy protection<\/a>, a little more than a year after he launched the media startup, and then sued its distribution partner, Trinity Broadcasting Network.<\/p>\nLast fall, a federal bankruptcy judge ordered the network liquidated, finding evidence that McGraw deleted text messages to conceal plans favoring certain creditors over others.<\/p>\n
At the time, a spokesperson for McGraw\u2019s production company vigorously denied the accusation that he destroyed evidence and said he was appealing the ruling.<\/p>\n
McGraw later launched Envoy Media, prompting accusations the bankruptcy was filed in bad faith specifically to escape creditors and fund his new venture, which he denied.<\/p>\n
Chip Babcock, a lawyer representing Envoy Media, disputed Sharell\u2019s allegations, calling the lawsuit \u201can effort to avoid a pending arbitration to which Sharell contractually agreed which he has now violated in a number of ways. The company and Dr. Phil will vigorously defend these claims,\u201d in a statement to The Times. <\/p>\n
\u201cJerry Sharell was put on hiatus over the summer as is common in this industry, especially with a media start up. He was not fired for any reason and certainly not because of his sexual orientation. These allegations against Envoy and Dr. Phil are made up out of whole cloth as he has a 25 year history of treating the LGBTQ+ communities with dignity and respect, including standing up for his guests who were attacked because of their sexual preferences.\u201d<\/p>\n
In his complaint, Sharell states that McGraw told him he would remain in California, saying, \u201cyou\u2019re Hollywood.\u201d However, the publicist said he came to the realization that \u201cMcGraw did not want him present in the building or attending meetings with TBN executives.\u201d<\/p>\n
Merit Street was a joint venture with the Trinity Broadcasting Network (TBN), the largest Christian-based network. Sharell said that he was given a copy of the Employee Handbook, and employees \u201cwere asked to sign a \u2018Statement of Faith\u2019 declaring their devotion to Jesus.\u201d<\/p>\n
Although he remained in L.A., starting in spring 2024 Sharell began traveling monthly to the Dallas headquarters of Merit Street, where he said many TBN employees now worked. During his first visit he alleged that a man known as \u201cPastor D\u201d came weekly to pray with employees, leaving prayer cards on the desks of those who did not participate including that of Sharell\u2019s.<\/p>\n
Pastor D also led prayer services at an open house event for advertisers, prospective investors and media, that Sharell found \u201cboth disturbing and shocking, given he had never known Defendant McGraw to be overly religious,\u201d according to the complaint.<\/p>\n
During another visit, Sharell alleges that an IT employee noticed a photograph of Sharell while working on a staffer\u2019s computer and said, \u201cThere\u2019s too many of THEM around here. And it\u2019s evil.\u201d<\/p>\n
While traveling on a private plane with McGraw, wife Robin McGraw and other individuals, Sharell claims he was answering emails and did not hear McGraw, who said, \u201cJeez, he\u2019s gayer than a fruit basket and not listening.\u201d<\/p>\n
The publicist said that he worked for McGraw for 10 years until March 2026, \u201cadvancing, protecting, publicizing, protecting, and supporting\u201d McGraw and his enterprises.<\/p>\n
According to the suit, Sharell worked through the Merit Street bankruptcy and the subsequent establishment of Envoy Media, \u201creceiving assignments and direction\u201d from McGraw, dealing with executives and securing media placements among other duties.<\/p>\n
After the company transitioned to Envoy Media, Sharell states in his lawsuit he went from being treated as an employee with benefits to being characterized as an independent contractor, losing his benefits, including health coverage and his compensation was reduced by 30%.<\/p>\n
Sharell alleges that although his job remained the same, that he felt \u201ccompelled\u201d to accept the new arrangement while under \u201ca great deal of duress and stress,\u201d during which he said he was \u201creminded\u201d by Envoy Media Chief Executive Ken Solomon that McGraw valued \u201cloyalty.\u201d<\/p>\n
Then, in March, Sharell received a call from Solomon informing him that his position was being put on \u201chiatus\u201d due to \u201cfinancial considerations,\u201d even though no other employees were put in hiatus or had their salaries reduced.<\/p>\n
He said he told Solomon that he felt he was \u201cbeing singled out or targeted,\u201d according to the lawsuit.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Phil McGraw\u2019s longtime publicist has filed a lawsuit against the celebrity therapist, better known as Dr. Phil, on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":412781,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[150,152,151,69048,7750,144024,16401,144023,144028,144021,66902,1932,144025,144022,9358,144026,144027,63127],"class_list":["post-412780","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arlington","tag-arlington","tag-arlington-headlines","tag-arlington-news","tag-claim","tag-discrimination","tag-dr-phil","tag-employee","tag-envoy-media","tag-hiatus","tag-jerry-sharell","tag-last-year","tag-lawsuit","tag-longtime-publicist","tag-mcgraw","tag-medium","tag-merit-street-media","tag-production-company","tag-wrongful-termination"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412780","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=412780"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412780\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/412781"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=412780"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=412780"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=412780"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}