Former Miss Calif. Carrie Prejean Countersued

By Lawrence D. Jones, Christian Post Reporter Tuesday, October 20, 2009

The organization that directs the Miss California USA pageant is countersuing former beauty queen Carrie Prejean over the breast augmentation surgery it had helped to fund prior to this year's Miss USA pageant.

"Had [Prejean] heeded the guidance of the Gospel of John, who admonished only those who are without sin to cast stones in judgment, she might have avoided this legal battle," states the lawsuit filed by K2 Productions, alluding to the suit Prejean filed this past August.

Nearly three months after the Miss California crown was taken away from her, 22-year-old Prejean filed a lawsuit against pageant officials for libel, slander, and religious discrimination, claiming that she has been subject to public ridicule and humiliation and lost out on modeling work because she lost her crown.

The lawsuit also accuses pageant executive director Keith Lewis, Shanna Moakler – who served as a co-director before she resigned in protest of Prejean – and publicist Roger Neal, who handles press for Miss California USA and Lewis, of using Internet sites such as Facebook and Twitter to post disparaging remarks about her.

Furthermore, the suit claims that Moakler and Lewis improperly revealed that Miss California USA had paid for Prejean's breast implants and that Lewis and Moakler both told Prejean not to mention God on her Miss USA application or at public events at least two months before she took her highly publicized stance for traditional marriage during the Miss USA pageant.

Since her firing, Prejean has suffered anxiety, depression and loss of sleep, the lawsuit adds.

In their countersuit, however, K2 Production claims Prejean's lawsuit is merely an attempt "to extend her notoriety."

Furthermore, Prejean's breast augmentation "ceased being private during the swimsuit competition of the nationally-televised Miss USA pageant, in which Ms. Prejean walked the stage in a bikini," they added.

Holding to this, K2 Productions is demanding that Prejean pay them back the $5,200 that was spent for the breast augmentation surgery, which they also insist she had requested for.

Prejean's attorney, Charles LiMandri, has called the countersuit "just the latest installment in K2 Production's ongoing smear campaign against Carrie Prejean."

"They have proven, once again, that they will use whatever scurrilous accusations they can dredge up – or invent – to try and tarnish Carrie's reputation and her good name," LiMandri expressed in a statement.

"It is both appalling and pathetic to see K2 and their friends in Hollywood try to destroy this young woman simply for standing up for her beliefs," he added.

Next month, Prejean is expected to come out with a tell-all book that will reveal "her side of the story."

The book, tentatively titled "Still Standing," will be released by conservative publisher Regnery Publishing.