Woman chased by fake alien sues show
Wednesday, February 19, 2003 Posted: 9:35 AM EST (1435 GMT)
LOS ANGELES, California (Reuters) -- Kara Blanc thought she was being chased by a space alien on her way to a posh Hollywood party and was terrified. But the alien turned out to be an actor in a monster suit and the party was phony as well.
So now the Los Angeles grade school teacher and aspiring actress is fighting back, suing the new reality TV series "Scare Tactics," claiming she suffered severe emotional damage, court papers said Tuesday.
Blanc sued the Sci-Fi Channel, the producers of "Scare Tactics" and two actors for scaring her so badly that she had to be hospitalized several times for "physical injuries" and "severe emotional distress," her lawsuit said.
Blanc said she was a "nonconsenting and unwitting victim" of the hidden camera show with a science fiction twist.
According to Blanc's lawsuit, she was sucked into a "Scare Tactic" episode last March 1 by actors Mathew Mertha and Travis Draft, who said they were taking her to "an exclusive Hollywood industry party at a desert resort" near Los Angeles.
On the way to the resort, the car that the trio were riding in stalled in a remote desert road and Mertha and Draft "feigned that they were being seriously physically injured ... or killed " by a costumed "alien," the lawsuit said.
Mertha and Draft allegedly told a terrified Blanc to run into a "dark, desert canyon area" to escape, the suit said.
Hidden cameras secretly recorded her reaction to the staged scenario. Neither Blanc nor her attorney could be reached for comment Tuesday.
Blanc teaches dance, music, drama and performance art and is certified as a crisis counselor. She is also an aspiring actress who co-hosted a mock-documentary film with Draft.
Sci-Fi Channel spokeswoman Kat Stein declined comment on the case but said the premise of "Scare Tactics" was to film "friends setting their friends up with a prank."
Pending episodes feature campers who believe mythical mountain creature Bigfoot attacks them, and limousine passengers who are chased by "government agents" when they stray into Area 51, a super-secret U.S. military facility at the center of UFO and conspiracy stories.
