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A couple of British Columbia-based photographers have sued the Blonde and Blonder duo for assault, battery and defamation stemming from a run-in they had last November—the same incident that had Richards lobbing two laptops from a hotel balcony and bruising the arm of a wheelchair-bound woman in the process. In their lawsuit filed Friday in Los Angeles Superior Court, plaintiffs Scott Cosman and Rik Fedyck charge that they were snapping pictures of Richards and Anderson at the River Rock Casino Resort in Vancouver, where the actresses were filming their upcoming blonde-buddy comedy, when Richards launched into a 20-minute, expletive-laced tirade and became physically abusive. Before giving their computers the ol' heave-ho, Richards called Cosman and Fedyck "scumbags, douche bags, paparazzi scum and f--ing c--ksucking paparazzi scum," the lawsuit claims. The Wild Things star also pushed and hit them, the photographers said. Anderson is named in the suit because both she and her costar "made repeated false and defamatory statements" to police who were investigating the incident (criminal charges were never filed against Richards) and to the media, including that the shutterbugs snuck onto the Blonde and Blonder set, were harassing the film's stars, provoked Richards with insults and threats of physical harm and eventually had to be escorted from the set by security, according to the court documents. This "vile, base, loathsome and contemptible" behavior, the plaintiffs stated, has resulted in "anxiety, nightmares, sleeplessness, emotional distress" and "fear and worry over the possibility of being unable to continue working as freelance celebrity and sports photographers in the future." Cosman and Fedyck are seeking unspecified damages for their laundry list of charges, which includes defamation, invasion of privacy, intentional infliction of emotional distress, assault, battery, false arrest, negligence and "interference with prospective economic advantage." Meanwhile, the two elderly women, ages 81 and 90, who were on the unintentional receiving end of Richards' laptop toss opted not to press charges. It was reported soon after that the film's production company went ahead and reimbursed Cosman and Fedyck $13,000 for their broken equipment. Richards also told Access Hollywood at the time that, while she wasn't proud of her behavior, she had tried to politely ask one of the photographers if he could just snap a few shots and then leave. "He wouldn't, and he got really belligerent, and he was saying vulgar, nasty things to me and made a derogatory remark about my family. I just did what I did and I feel terrible." Then, in a statement released by Richards' publicist: "Based on the actions of the paparazzi they are lucky their laptops were the only things that were thrown off the ledge." |
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