Dethroned beauty says her beliefs eventually cost her her crown

Sep 1, 2009 12:59 GMT  ·  By
Carrie Prejean is taking the Miss California USA organization to court over religious discrimination
   Carrie Prejean is taking the Miss California USA organization to court over religious discrimination

Miss California Carrie Prejean was the favorite for the title of Miss USA, but she eventually lost the crown to another girl when she gave her honest and unveiled opinion on Prop 8 and same-gender marriages. Following weeks of media scrutiny and intense debates, Prejean was eventually asked to step down as well as Miss California, since she came to represent something that the pageant did not wish to be associated with. Prejean is now suing the Miss California USA organization for discrimination, TMZ says.

In court documents just filed, Carrie claims she was robbed of her crown for reasons that had absolutely nothing to do with her abilities to be a beauty queen, but rather that were closely connected to who she was as a person. The fact that the Miss USA Organization has said all along that she failed to fulfill her contractual obligations as Miss California, Prejean says, was just another lie sold to the media and the public in order to further ruin her reputation. A lawsuit and winning the case will perhaps clear her good name, Carrie believes.

“Prejean just filed the suit in L.A. County Superior Court, accusing Moakler and pageant honcho Keith Lewis of religious discrimination, defamation, public disclosure of private facts, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and negligent infliction of emotional distress. Prejean was dethroned / fired from her post as Miss California USA back on June 10.” TMZ says of the lawsuit. Lewis and Moakler were two of the bigger players who spoke out against Prejean as to the ruling of Miss California in the scandal that ensued after her speech on the Miss USA beauty pageant.

While Moakler has denied all the allegations made by the dethroned beauty in the suit, Lewis is not ready to let this go without a fight – and let the public know what this is all about. According to the pageant official, Prejean is getting ready to launch her book and it’s probably no small coincidence that the lawsuit and the release are so close to one another, as the beauty queen might have filed the papers to get more media attention for the book. It wouldn’t really be an out-of-the-ordinary practice, should that be the case with Prejean too.

“It appears that suits from both sides are now inevitable against the other. I would guess Carrie sees it as a chance to get publicity for her upcoming book because in the interviews I have seen, she talks about the suit and the book in the same breath. We have no problem with her selling lots of books – considering in the current situation we could stand to profit from every copy she sells. For us, it has never been about her beliefs and we have always just wanted to move on.” Lewis says in a statement released for the same media outlet.