Jury Rules Against Woman on ‘Girls Gone Wild’

ST. LOUIS (CN) - A jury ruled against a woman who claimed her reputation was ruined after she appeared in a "Girls Gone Wild" video without her permission. She claimed that after she refused to participate in the film, she was sabotaged by another woman who yanked her tank top down, exposing her breasts.

The plaintiff, identified only as Jane Doe, was 20 when the footage was shot at the Rum Jungle Bar in May 2004. Her lawyer, Stephen Evans, argued that she never gave consent and could even be heard on the video responding "no" when asked to show her breasts, shortly before another woman came up from behind and pulled her tank top down.

Doe, now 26 and a married mother of two, sued in 2008 after a friend of her husband's reported that she was in one of the "Girls Gone Wild" videos. She had asked for $5 million in damages, including $1.5 million in what they estimated the video, "Girls Gone Wild Sorority Orgy," made.

But the St. Louis jury rejected Doe's claim after just 90 minutes of deliberation, agreeing with the defense's claim that she silently gave consent by taking part in the party.

"Through her actions, she gave implied consent," Jury Foreman Patrick O'Brien told the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. "She was really playing to the camera. She knew what she was doing."

Doe's lawyer disagreed with the decision.

"Other girls said it was OK," Evans told the Post-Dispatch. "Not one other one said, 'No, no.' She is entitled to go out with friends and have a good time and not have her top pulled down and get that in a video."

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