Ex-Fox Family Chief Sues Firm for $12.7 Million

Fox Family Worldwide, which is being purchased by Walt Disney Co., faces a $12.7-million breach-of-contract lawsuit from the former president of the children’s cable-TV network.

Rich Cronin claims he was never allowed to exercise his lucrative stock-option package when he was fired from Fox Family in May 2000. Cronin claims in his lawsuit, filed Tuesday in Los Angeles Superior Court, that stock options lured him from Viacom Inc.’s TV Land network in July 1998.

Cronin seeks the value of the stock options, estimated at $11.9 million, as well as $712,916 in wages. Cronin’s lawsuit, which also claims a breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, seeks unspecified punitive damages.

Executives at Fox Family, a venture of News Corp. and Saban Entertainment, did not immediately return a call for comment. Disney, the world’s second-largest media company, in July agreed to buy Fox Family for $5.3 billion.