Posted on 05/14/2002 9:22:57 PM PDT by Bubba_Leroy
Texas college student Amber Kulhanek maintains she is not a wild party girl. But a $5 million default judgment she won against a video company that filmed her topless was set aside in March. A judge determined that defendants in the invasion of privacy case were not properly served.
Kulhanek claims that she was coerced into being filmed, topless, while celebrating her 21st birthday on South Padre Island, Texas. Images of the event showed up in cable television commercials for "Wild Party Girls," a video montage that retails for $19.97.
According to Kulhanek, video producers were in cahoots with bartenders, who allegedly encouraged her to drink to excess. Then, the Southwest Texas State University student says, she was goaded into participating in a wet T-shirt contest.
Makers of the video, the AccroMedia Group Inc., dispute that account. They also maintain they were never served notice of the lawsuit.
On March 28, Hays County Judge Charles Ramsey granted their motion to set aside the default judgment, after finding that the named defendant, "Arco Media Group Inc.," does not exist. Ramsey also wrote that Kulhaneks lawyer, David K. Sergi, presented no evidence that his client suffered any damages caused by the defendant. E! Online Inc., which aired the commercial featuring Kulhanek, is also named as a defendant in the case. Kulhanek v. AccroMedia Group Inc., No. 01-0505.
Sean E. Breen, who represents AccroMedia, says his client thought the matter had been resolved in 2001, when the company removed Kulhaneks image from the product. At that point, Breen says, Sergi told AccroMedia that "theres no need to answer the lawsuit, even though we were never served."
Now the parties are engaged in discovery, Breen says. One issue is whether the plaintiff was drunk when the video was shot. Breen says theres no evidence to suggest that she was. He plans to file a summary judgment motion.
Sergi, who practices in San Marcos, did not return phone calls seeking comment. In a previous interview, he said the video caused Kulhanek to drop out of school for a semester.
"Everybody and their brother in her college community were poking fun at her," Sergi told the ABA Journal eReport. "Basically, they were making her life a living hell."
Maybe next time she won't get drunk and strip in a bar.
Her parents must be very proud putting forth that kind of money for their daughter to blow it getting slobbering drunk and stripping in public.
It's the video's fault, not the drunken bimbo's.
I'm sorry ladies, the guys asked if you'd flash for the camera and you flashed for the camera. Dumb, da, dumb, dumb...
When these videos were first shot, the producers didn't get release forms. Hey, they asked the women for permission and the women gladly flashed for them. After being sued a few times, they now get release forms.
Strangely, the women sign them and keep flashing. Like this girl and others wouldn't have. How stupid.
She's cute, and that's coming from a "morena" man.
Lazamataz - getting all committed and monogamous on us!
My buddy has a saying down here in SoFlo. It goes "Cazado pero no capado!"
Married, but still "intact" - LOL!
(OK, so in reality I'm considered "whipped". The day I explained to my wife what a "Colombian Nectie" was, she thought it was FUNNY. It kind of put the relationship into perspective for me! *grin*)
Congrats and many, many years of happiness to you btw!
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