NOLA Radio: WWL Accuses Seth Dunlap Of Extortion

Entercom WWL Radio officials believe the homophobic slur tweeted from the station’s official account to talk show host Seth Dunlap earlier this month was sent from Dunlap’s personal cellphone, according to nola.com citing a New Orleans Police Department report.

The station also has accused the 35-yer-old Dunlap, who is openly gay, of threatening the station that he would go “scorched earth” over the tweet and demanding more than $1.8 million in compensation while he was facing personal financial troubles, said the police report, which was obtained Thursday through a public records request.

The police report, which summarizes allegations leveled by WWL Senior Vice President Kevin Cassidy and attorneys for the station’s corporate parent, Philadlephia-based Entercom, suggested law enforcement was still working to corroborate the station’s allegations.

For now, police have classified the case as a possible extortion, which Louisiana law defines, in part, as “the communication of threats to another with the intention (to) obtain anything of value.” It is punishable by up to 15 years in prison.

Dunlap's attorney, Megan Kiefer, said Entercom's allegations as presented in the police report were "defamatory and self-serving," and her client maintains the company's complaint is "littered with falsehoods." 

Records show WWL filed its complaint against Dunlap on Tuesday. On Wednesday, Dunlap announced he had passed a lie-detector test on whether he had accessed the station’s Twitter profile to post the tweet himself or worked with someone else to do so.

Kiefer also has announced her client’s intention to sue the station, arguing that the tweet hinted at a broader homophobic culture at the station and was part of a hostile workplace.

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She said her client did not have password access to WWL Radio’s Twitter profile, adding Thursday, "It is truly reprehensible (the station) would be attempting to blame the victim of its own anti-LGBT culture, and they are only compounding the severe damage that Mr. Dunlap has experienced at the hands of Entercom."

Kiefer’s announcement on Wednesday beat, by minutes, WWL Radio’s own statement saying it had completed an internal investigation aimed at identifying who had sent out the tweet, an inquiry that the station said involved a digital forensic expert and an outside lawyer.

Though the station didn’t publicly identify any individual as having posted the tweet, it said it had determined that bringing the information it uncovered to the NOPD was the appropriate next step.

According to WWL Radio, the station had been receiving “letters in the past few months regarding wage garnishment” for Dunlap’s personal debts, the police report said.

“Apparently, Mr. Dunlap has a variety of unpaid credit cards and personal loans, and the companies holding the debt are going into collections for the unpaid amount,” it said.

The report released Thursday notes surveillance footage showed Dunlap was in his office with the door closed at the time the tweet was sent. He then opened the door and walked out to show his phone to a co-worker, “apparently talking about the tweet.”

Dunlap, a Washington state native, had been hosting his own weeknight show, “The Last Lap With Seth Dunlap,” on WWL Radio since 2017. He had previously co-hosted a sports show after beginning his career at the station as a sales representative.