John Melendez: Last News

exploited his name and voice to promote Stern’s shows.Melendez — who left Stern’s radio show in 2004 after 15 years — filed suit against the network in 2020 claiming it was using old recordings on two channels dedicated to Stern to attract listeners without his permission.On Tuesday, Manhattan’s 2nd Circuit Court of appeals unanimously upheld a lower court’s 2021 decision tossing Melendez’s suit, finding that SiriusXM doesn’t owe Melendez any damages.The ruling found that Melendez wasn’t covered by federal copyright laws because he failed to allege that SiriusXM made money off of his name rather than off of the archival episode excerpts they aired that featured his voice.Melendez was on “The Howard Stern Show” from 1988 to 2004 when he left for NBC’s “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno.” Stern gave Melendez his nickname because of his lifelong speech impediment.Stern’s show moved from the radio to Sirius in 2006 under a five-year $500 million contract — that included the rights to air old shows featuring Melendez.“While we respectfully disagree with the court’s ruling, we note that it took them 34 pages to render its decision and the 2nd used this case as the opportunity to clarify the prevailing law in the Circuit,” Melendez’ lawyer Michael Popok told The Post. “Mr.

NEW YORK — John Melendez, who became known as Stuttering John as a longtime sidekick to radio and television host Howard Stern, has sued Sirius XM Holdings Inc for using his name, likeness and voice without permission on channels dedicated to Stern.Melendez, who left Stern’s radio show after more than 15 years in 2004 and became the announcer for NBC’s “The Tonight Show With Jay Leno,” on Wednesday accused Sirius of exploiting his celebrity to attract more listeners and advertising.He said Sirius responded to his recent cease-and-desist letter by marginalizing his contributions to Stern’s show and threatening to take his current show, “The Stuttering John Podcast,” off its Pandora streaming service.“Sirius has earned hundreds of millions of