An attorney representing Lindsay Lohan in a car wreck says the other driver is using lies about the starlet being drunk "as a battering ram to force a settlement," court papers obtained Wednesday show.
Raymundo Ortega, of Los Angeles, filed a negligence lawsuit against Lohan on June 14 and is seeking at least $200,000 in damages.
Ortega, a busboy, alleges she was trying to flee photographers when her car hit his van in West Hollywood nearly two years ago, and that she had been drinking earlier.
A 10-page brief was filed Friday by Lohan’s attorney Alfred W. Gerisch in support of a motion to dismiss the lawsuit or to strike parts of it. The court papers also offered a response to allegations by Ortega's lawyer, Robert G. Klein, that Lohan was intoxicated.
A hearing on Lohan's motions is scheduled for Tuesday before Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Michael L. Stern.
No sobriety tests were done that could support the intoxication claim, Gerisch's court papers state.
The drunken driving allegation is untrue and not supported by the CHP report, Gerisch maintains. Gerisch is asking the judge to strike Ortega's $200,000 damage claim and his additional request for punitive damages.
Gerisch additionally denies -- in court papers -- allegations in the Ortega lawsuit that Lohan is using her corporation, Crossheart Productions Inc., "to shield her personal assets and as a method to perpetuate fraud on creditors."
Gerisch calls the statements "irrelevant and inflammatory."
But in Klein's court papers, he criticizes Gerisch for using a police report to support his contention that Lohan was not intoxicated at the time of the accident.
Klein calls the report hearsay. He also states the reporting officer did not see how fast Lohan was driving before the accident and also does not know whether she was drinking beforehand.
Klein further states that his client has witnesses who will support his allegations Lohan was driving as fast as 62 mph and that "there is some evidence she was served alcohol shortly before the accident" while at The Ivy restaurant in West Hollywood.
The Ivy also is named as a defendant in Ortega's suit. Court papers filed in behalf of the restaurant deny any wrongdoing on the part of those at the establishment that day.
Klein's court papers also ask the judge to take judicial notice of reports in the media and on the Internet that the actress had been in drug and alcohol rehabilitation centers twice by the time she was 20. Lohan is now 21.
"The fact that Ms. Lohan was admitted to rehab for alcohol abuse shortly after this accident raises a presumption that at the time of this accident she was under the influence," Klein states in his court papers.
But Gerisch replies in his court papers that Klein has not identified the Web sites in which the articles originated and also has failed to prove their authenticity.
The collision between Lohan's black Mercedes-Benz SL65 -- worth about $200,000, according to Klein's court papers -- and Ortega's van occurred about 5 p.m. on Oct. 4, 2005, on Robertson Boulevard, just south of Beverly Boulevard, according to the lawsuit.
The suit alleges the actress, then 19, was looking over her shoulder instead of watching the road because she had been sensitive to paparazzi and often drove recklessly after a May 2005 accident in which a photographer rammed her car.
The California Highway Patrol report states that Lohan complained of leg and back pain and was interviewed later at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. She said she was driving north on Robertson at 30 mph when Ortega turned in front of her and she was unable to avoid hitting the van, according to the report.
The report states that Ortega was at fault for making an illegal U-turn.
Klein counters in his court papers that Ortega was trying to get to the other side of Robertson Boulevard to a parking space when he was hit by Lohan's car while halfway through his turn.
"Instead of seeing if Mr. Ortega needed medical assistance, Lindsay Lohan fled the scene and took refuge in a retail store," Klein's court papers state.
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