Netflix/Piers Morgan Uncensored/YouTube
- Fiona Harvey is suing Netflix, accusing it of defaming her in its portrayal of a stalker in "Baby Reindeer."
- The show is based on Richard Gadd's real-life experiences with a stalker during his early career.
- Harvey says the show misrepresented her, leading to public identification and reputational damage.
Fiona Harvey, the woman who says she's the real version of the semi-fictionalized stalker in the Netflix hit "Baby Reindeer," is suing the streaming giant.
Harvey, a 58-year-old Scot, filed a lawsuit on Thursday in California, seeking more than $170 million and a jury trial. She's accusing Netflix of defamation and intentional affliction of emotional distress, among other points.
She hasn't sued the show's creator and star, Richard Gadd, who plays a fictional version of himself named Donny Dunn. "Baby Reindeer" is based on his experiences with being stalked by a woman earlier in his career when he was trying to make it as a comedian.
In the complaint, Harvey's lawyers said the show was a "brutal lie" that brought her unwanted attention, including death threats.
"Netflix and Gadd destroyed her reputation, her character and her life," the attorneys wrote.
On- and off-screen, Netflix has repeatedly said "Baby Reindeer" is a true story.
"We intend to defend this matter vigorously and to stand by Richard Gadd's right to tell his story," a Netflix spokesperson told Business Insider.
The company hasn't yet filed a response to the lawsuit.
The real Martha Scott
As the show picked up viewers, armchair sleuths raced to find the "real" stalker, named Martha Scott in the show, and the man who Gadd said abused him.
In late April, Gadd asked fans not to speculate about the real people behind the show's characters. He told GQ he disguised the stalker's identity in the show.
"What's been borrowed is an emotional truth, not a fact-by-fact profile of someone," Gadd said.
In the lawsuit, Harvey said she was identified days after the show's April debut. Her attorneys said people found a public 2014 tweet she sent to Gadd that used a phrase repeated in the show.
Harvey's court filing outlined similarities between the stalker character and herself: a Scottish woman about 20 years older than Gadd living in London, with a similar appearance and speaking patterns. Both the character and Harvey were accused of stalking a lawyer. It's unclear whether that reference is to an old colleague of Harvey's who told BI on Thursday that Harvey harassed her from 1997 to 2002.
But Harvey says that, unlike the fictional Martha Scott, she's not a convicted stalker, nor has she pleaded guilty to any crime. Her complaint says Netflix didn't check any facts central to the show, including that the stalker sexually assaulted Gadd. She said she didn't have any sexual encounters with the comedian.
In an interview with Piers Morgan in early May, Harvey said that while she might have emailed Gadd, it was nowhere near the 40,000 messages he said the stalker sent him. She denied harassing Gadd and said she knew him from when she was bartending in London.