Paris Hilton’s ex-boyfriend slapped her with a $10 million lawsuit yesterday as the hotel heiress remained in hiding in her L.A. mansion after returning from a trip to Australia.
Producer Rick Salomon, whose hard-core video of the couple having sex was bought by a Seattle Internet pornographer who planned to market it, also sued the hotel heiress’ parents, Rick and Kathy Hilton, as well as her spokeswoman Siri Garber for slander.
In a fiercely worded complaint filed Wednesday in L.A. Superior Court, Salomon’s lawyer Martin Singer claimed that the defendants had “aimed at portraying Salomon as a criminal who took advantage of an incapacitated young woman. … Defendants claimed that Hilton was so out of it that she could not even hold herself up.”
But Singer counters that “Hilton repeatedly posed and preened in front of the camera … [taking] control of the camcorder and film[ing] herself in the bathroom” where, she told Salomon, “her breasts looked much better” in the light.
Singer also claims the Hiltons slandered the producer by claiming Paris may have been “underage” at the time of the videotaped encounter. But Salomon claims in the suit that Paris was 20 in May 2001, when she made the video with him.
Singer says Salomon will also sue former friend Don Thrasher, who told the TV show “Celebrity Justice” that he received $50,000 for selling the tape to pornographer Roger Valdocz, and that he gave $25,000 of it in cash to Salomon. Salomon denies making a dime off the tape, the original of which he still has.
Garber wasn’t talking. A spokeswoman for the elder Hiltons told us, “I called Mrs. Hilton, and the family is not releasing any comments today.”
Paris was uncharacteristically silent, remaining at home with sister Nicky and a cousin.
But Lizzie Grubman, who today goes on “The John Walsh Show” to defend her pal, told us, “She’ll survive this.”
The firestorm ignited just as Hilton’s upcoming celebutantes-on-a-farm show, “The Simple Life,” received solid reviews – but Fox executives have to be pondering the effect of the unsavory Internet action, as do producers of “The Cat in the Hat,” in which Hilton has a part.
Lawyer Singer has no doubt: “Hilton,” he writes in the suit, “has become famous merely by acting famous.”