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from www.onpointnews.com – Four women who lost a sexual exploitation case against “Girls Gone Wild” founder Joe Francis are seeking a new trial, saying a jury awarded them no damages last month because he stigmatized them as “sluts.”

The verdict concluded a bizarre trial during which Francis represented himself until the judge found him in contempt for asking one of the plaintiffs if she was a prostitute. The only issue before the jury was damages but it awarded the plaintiffs nothing — even though it ruled that Francis acted outrageously by using images of them flashing their breasts in “Girls Gone Wild” videos.

The women were all minors when a “Wild” camera crew filmed them while they were visiting Panama City, Fla., for spring break. One of them also alleged that Francis paid her $50 to masturbate him.

In a motion for a new trial, the plaintiffs cite the closing argument of Francis attorney Rachel Seaton-Virga in which she said they were not “innocent girls who aren’t somewhat familiar with what goes on on spring break … It is a moral cesspool at spring break in Panama City Beach … And these girls knew exactly what went on at spring break.”

By eliciting the “’slut’ stereotype,” the plaintiffs say, Seaton-Virga

made it impossible for the jury to ignore the issue of consent as this Court directed the jury to do and as the law requires. In this stereotype, the “slut” has already consented, she cannot not consent, and a pornographer simply reveals her “true” nature, no matter how young she is: 17, 16, 15, or 13.

The use of the stereotype “explains the internal inconsistency in the verdict,” the motion argues. “No matter what Francis did to these girls, once they were painted as ‘sluts,’ Francis could not damage them.”

Francis says in a brief opposing the motion that “The record supports Francis’ contention that Plaintiffs fabricated psychological harm for the hopes of a substantial monetary damage award.”

Plaintiffs’ attorney Larry Selander suggested to the jury that it award $17 million in emotional distress damages, representing the amount of revenue generated by videos featuring three of the women. “’GGW’ was like a stone being thrown in the middle of these women’s lives,” clinical psychologist Leslie Lebowitz, the plaintiffs’ expert, testified.

The women told the jury they were branded as “sluts” and “whores” after they appeared in the videos. One plaintiff described a nervous breakdown and another said she attempted suicide.

During cross-examination, Seaton-Virga confronted Lebowitz with records in which the plaintiffs said nothing to medical and psychiatric professionals about being traumatized by the videos. But plaintiffs’ co-counsel Rachael G. Pontikes says the records were inadmissible because they were not included in the defense’s pre-trial list of exhibits.

“Th[e] verdict is a miscarriage of justice; it finds that a pornographer can exploit teenage girls without damaging them, which declares ‘open season’ on teenage girls and invites their sexual exploitation by adult men,” Pontikes argues.

A St. Louis judge in November granted a new trial to a woman who claimed she did not consent to appearing topless in a “Girls Gone Wild” video. In another “blame-the-victim” defense, Francis’s Mantra Films said she gave her implied consent by dancing flirtatiously in a bar but the judge said it was clear she was “an unwilling participant in the exposure of her breasts.”

U.S. District Judge Richard Smoak will decide whether the Florida plaintiffs get a new trial. He’s not exactly a fan of Francis, having ordered him last year to pay $58,614 in plaintiffs’ attorney fees and expenses for discovery violations.

Seaton-Virga and husband Gerard M. Virga took over Francis’s defense halfway through the trial. While he represented himself, Smoak reprimanded him for “behaving like a four-year-old” and told him to “conduct yourself like you would at your grandmother’s house.”

You have to wonder if Smoak can bear the thought of having to go through the whole charade all over again.