Hopeful’s lawsuit touched off by missing photos
She’s a Playboy centerfold-in-waiting — a 48-year-old woman wrapped in the body of a 21-year-old. But when Zipora Kochman wasn’t selected after a photo test, she sued Santa Monica-based Playboy Studio West, claiming she was improperly touched by the photographer.
But the $5,000 suit failed when she didn’t produce any medical evidence to support her claim of emotional distress. The aftermath has left Playboy and a judge believing the case was more about sour grapes than a sour touch, and has left Kochman vaguely fearful of retribution.
At law, Kochman, of Los Angeles, couldn’t sue for being rejected, although she was clearly miffed. But to even get to first base in her case claiming sexual harassment and discrimination, she would need to prove damages. Pro-tem judge Gerald Yoshida ruled in small claims court recently that she had failed to meet the burden of proof. The amount — $5,000 — is the maximum for a small claims action.
Kochman auditioned at Playboy Studio West in September of 2000. Playboy took several Polaroid pictures of Kochman, as well as several other women. The photo shoot was done each Thursday as part of a routine recruiting effort, said Playboy attorney Alexander Rufus- Issacs. Playboy destroys the photographs of the woman who are not selected at the end of the year, although it keeps applicants’ bios on file, he said.
“At that point, she is not selected to go any further,”
Rufus-Issacs said. “So far as Playboy is concerned, it’s the end of the matter.”
But Kochman said she became increasingly concerned several months later about the Polaroids taken of her. She had watched a television documentary that showed how fly-by-night operators obtain photographs of women and use them improperly on the Internet and in adult magazines.
She also claimed the Playboy photographer “put me on the sofa and made me spread my legs and he was touching me.”
She repeatedly called Playboy Studio West in an attempt to retrieve the photos, fearful that they would end up in the wrong hands. But they had been thrown away and no one at the offices remembered who she was, Playboy officials said.
“So she decided to be a little more cunning and she makes the same appointment for auditions that she had done in September that next August,” Rufus-Issacs asserted. “But she’s turned down again.”
He added that Kochman’s sexual harassment and age discrimination claims indicate she was more upset about not being selected as a Playboy model than she was about her missing photos. He added that Kochman agreed to the release of the photos when she signed her bio sheet. Sexual harassment and age discrimination claims would cover only company employees, Rufus-Issacs said.
“Really there is no legal basis for any of her claims,” he said. “She doesn’t appear to have suffered any damage aside from not appearing in Playboy. People do not have a right to appear in Playboy.”
Kochman believes she is Playboy material, insisting “I look like a movie star and I have the body of a 21 year old.” But, she added, “these people are so big and I’m the little person.”
Her claim that the Playboy photographer touched her inappropriately during the audition didn’t fly with pro-tem judge Yoshida. Though her damages were limited to an assertion that she felt “very uncomfortable,” Yoshida noted that she had agreed to be photographed in that manner. He agrees that the case was probably nothing more than sour grapes for not being selected by Playboy.
“I asked her for receipts for medical bills and medication as a result of the emotional distress,” he said. “But she couldn’t provide any.”
“She felt she was a very attractive woman in spite of her age and she felt she should have been selected,” he said, adding she did a sort of mock pose for him during her hour-long testimony. “But the fact of the matter was she didn’t do anything about the photographs until nine months later when she saw the television show.
“She didn’t prove her case well enough,” he said. “It was one of the stranger cases I’ve seen.”
Playboy’s Rufus-Issacs said he viewed the suit as a nuisance action.
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on December 3, 2001. Read the original PDF.