Hungarian Women Sues Hilton Heiress, Claims "Identity Theft"

Hoping to benefit from expanding international legal protection for trademarks and other non-tangible goods, a Budapest woman is suing American heiress and pseudo-celebrity Paris Hilton for violating her "intellectual property rights." According to papers filed yesterday in New York Superior Court, Szamanta Gyergyószépfalvy, 28, (right) is claiming that Hilton, 24, (left) improperly appropriated her "personal look" and used it to pioneer the so-called "slut fashion" craze that has led millions of young American women to throw away their nice clothes and dress and act like cheap tarts.

The lawsuit alleges that Hilton, who is world-famous for no reason other than being famous, got the idea for slut fashion from Gyergyószépfalvy, whom she met and "hung out loads with" while on a trip to Budapest in the summer of 1998. At the time, Hilton and most privileged young American women like her were known to dress in muted colors and natural fibers, and to behave with a certain basic level of social and sexual decorousness, while Hungarian girls like Csöpi wouldn't think of going out for a liter of milk unless they had done themselves up like a chick in a mid-1980s heavy metal video.

Adulation or appropriation: lawsuit alleges that Paris Hilton (above) pioneered the US "slut" fashion craze through improper theft of intellectual property from a Hungarian acquaintance.

"She stole the whole thing from me, from the rhinestone-encrusted acid-washed blue jeans to the white pants with contrasting butt-thong, to the bad makeup and sleeping with, you know, whoever," said the curvaceous Gyergyószépfalvy, known as "Csöpi," or "little one" to her family and boyfriends. "Without me, she'd still be wearing Lilly Pulitzer or some other flower-print preppy crap, and would never have become a famous pseudo-celebrity, the stuck-up little stick-insect."

In her suit, Gyergyószépfalvy seeks $10 million in damages from Hilton for failing to credit her as the inspiration for the look that has led millions of parents across North America to despair. Among the numerous photographic exhibits detailing Hilton's alleged "skanking up" after her time with Gyergyószépfalvy is a photo purporting to show the effects of too much exposure to artificial sun lamps (left), a common affliction of Hungary's plázacica ("shopping mall pussies"). "I even gave Paris her first coat of orange at my friend's turboszolárium [high-intensity tanning salon] on Ó utca," she said.

"She can say she came up with [slut fashion]," Gyergyószépfalvy added. "But I think it's just another example of a Hungarian innovation being stolen by foreigners."

Meanwhile, in addition to Gyergyószépfalvy's complaint, a group of women working in Budapest's adult entertainment industry are reportedly considering a class-action lawsuit against Hilton because of the infamous "amateur" porn video featuring the young heiress, which by some measures was the most downloaded internet file in 2004. According to one of the potential plaintiffs in that suit, Hilton's participation in the video without compensation constitutes a form of illegal economic "dumping," and unfairly undercuts her ability to legitimately earn a living.

"I don't care if she wants to make a video of herself getting jammed by every guy in New York and Los Angeles," said 23-year-old Dzsenifer "Vadkiscica" Alsóvölgypataky, who works as a dancer at a local disco when not making videos for one of several number of local online adult sites. "But you never do it for free - even if it's a boyfriend."