Larry King died on January 23, 2021, at the age of 87. More than four years later, his estate says, the legendary broadcaster's name and face were still being used to sell prostate pills, in violation of a settlement that was supposed to end exactly that practice.

King's estate has filed a lawsuit against Verified Nutrition and its owners, alleging the supplement company kept featuring King's likeness in advertisements for its product ProstaGenix long after his death and even after the two sides reached a deal in July 2025 that should have put a stop to it, the New York Post reported.

The suit paints a straightforward picture: a company that profited from a dead man's fame, agreed to stop, pocketed whatever goodwill the settlement bought, and then kept right on doing it anyway.

The deal King struck, and the one his estate says was broken

The business relationship between King and the defendants started in February 2017. King agreed to endorse ProstaGenix, a supplement that claims its ingredients help maintain prostate health and support urinary function. In exchange, King received $100,000 upfront and a six percent royalty on the product's net sales.

That arrangement ended when King died. But the ads didn't.

The lawsuit alleges that after King's death, Verified Nutrition continued to feature his likeness in ads, infomercials, and on third-party retailer sites including Amazon. Under California law, proceeds gained from King's likeness were supposed to go to his estate. The company, the suit claims, kept collecting the benefits of King's endorsement without compensating the people entitled to that revenue.

By July 2025, the two sides reached a settlement meant to resolve the dispute. The agreement included a $110,000 payment to the estate and set a hard deadline: July 14, 2025, for the supplement maker to stop using King's image, name, or likeness altogether. Shawn King, Larry's widow, signed the settlement document as the estate's representative.

The language of the settlement, as described in the suit, was aimed at cleaning the slate. It was intended to "resolve all claims that had arisen from defendant's wrongful conduct."

That should have been the end of it.

What King's heirs say happened next

It wasn't the end. King's heirs say his name and image continued to appear on multiple ProstaGenix websites after the July 14 deadline passed. The product also allegedly remained tied to King on Amazon and Walmart. On Walmart's site, the suit states, ProstaGenix was described as "Larry King's Secret Weapon."

That phrase alone tells you something about how central King's celebrity remained to the product's marketing, years after the man himself was gone.

ProstaGenix has also claimed endorsements from other well-known figures, including former NFL quarterback Joe Montana and astronaut Buzz Aldrin. But it is King's estate that has now taken the company to court, alleging a pattern of conduct that went beyond a simple oversight or slow website update.

The estate is not asking for a quiet correction. It is seeking a jury trial, a share of ProstaGenix's profits, $750 for every unauthorized use of King's image, and a permanent injunction. That injunction would bar the defendants from using "Larry King's name, voice, photograph, image or likeness" going forward.

A settlement that settled nothing

The core issue here is not complicated. A man's estate struck a deal. The deal had a dollar figure, $110,000, and a deadline, July 14, 2025. If the allegations hold up, the company took the settlement's benefits and ignored its obligations.

Settlements exist because they are cheaper and faster than litigation. They work only when both sides honor the terms. When one party treats a signed agreement as a suggestion, the entire mechanism breaks down. And the aggrieved party is forced back into court, spending more time and money to enforce a deal that was supposed to avoid exactly that.

ProstaGenix did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

What remains unclear

Several details are still missing from the public record. The specific court where the suit was filed has not been identified. The individual owners of Verified Nutrition named as defendants have not been publicly disclosed. The exact number of alleged unauthorized uses, each one potentially carrying a $750 penalty, is also unknown. And no direct link to the complaint or the original settlement document has surfaced.

Those gaps matter. The scope of the alleged violations will determine whether this case amounts to a modest cleanup or a significant financial reckoning for the supplement maker.

Celebrity likeness and the law

California has long recognized the right of individuals, and their estates, to control the commercial use of their name and image. That right does not expire at death. It passes to heirs. Companies that ignore it face real legal exposure, especially when the unauthorized use is tied directly to product sales on major retail platforms like Amazon and Walmart.

King spent decades as one of the most recognizable faces in American broadcasting. His name still carries weight. That weight has commercial value, value that belongs to his estate, not to a supplement company that failed to scrub its marketing materials on time.

The timeline laid out in the suit is damning in its simplicity. February 2017: partnership begins. January 2021: King dies. After January 2021: ads continue. July 2025: settlement reached, deadline set. After July 14, 2025: King's name and image still appear on the company's own websites and on retail giants.

Every step in that sequence gave Verified Nutrition another chance to do the right thing. If the estate's account is accurate, the company passed on every one of them.

What the estate wants

The demands are specific. A jury trial. Disgorgement of profits tied to the unauthorized use. A per-use penalty of $750. And a permanent court order barring any future use of King's name, voice, photograph, image, or likeness by the defendants.

That last item, the injunction, is telling. It signals that the estate does not trust a second agreement to do what the first one failed to accomplish. When you have to ask a judge to make someone stop doing what they already promised to stop doing, trust is gone.

Contracts and settlements are supposed to mean something. If a company can sign a deal, cash the certainty it provides, and then ignore the terms, the agreement is just a piece of paper. Larry King's estate is now asking a court to remind Verified Nutrition that paper with a signature on it still carries weight, even when the man whose face sold the product is no longer around to enforce it himself.