• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, October 25, 2006

Steve Koonin, the former Coca-Cola marketer who switched to the creative side as head of TNT and TBS, will add oversight of Turner Classic Movies (TCM) and the newly acquired Court TV as the new president of Turner Entertainment Networks.

Koonin will handle the outlets of each brand, including broadband and wireless, and any expansion into those and other areas.

Placing Court TV under the same executive who runs TNT and TBS is another sign that Turner intends to focus on building its prime-time offerings. The network focuses on legal news and trial broadcasts during the day, and its daytime block could have been placed under Turner's CNN umbrella.

Court TV has lost several top executives since Turner parent Time Warner took control this summer, but Marc Juris, general manager of programming and marketing, and Marlene Dann, executive vice president of daytime and news programming, are staying on and will report to the Atlanta-based Koonin.

Court TV COO Art Bell--who remained after Time Warner purchased the 50% of the network it didn't own in May--left last month.

Koonin reports to Mark Lazarus, president of Turner Entertainment Group. Under Koonin's leadership, TNT has launched drama hit "The Closer" and rebranded TBS as a comedy destination with the "very funny" tagline. TCM is commercial-free.

Koonin was executive vice president and COO of TNT and TBS. He joined Turner in 2000 after 14 years at Coca-Cola, where he rose to vice president of consumer marketing.