Talented dancer Patricia Douglas was, in 1937, labelled number 27 of 120 underage chorus girls tricked into attending a stag party at a convention for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer visiting salesmen, who had, by then, been drinking heavily for three days. While trying to flee the scene; Patricia, a virgin tee-totaler, was violently abused and brutally raped by salesmen David Ross (who died of rectal cancer in 1962).
Defying the powerful studio, though the local police and physician, Dr. Edward Lindquist, would not, filing no reports and ruining evidence; Douglas, arguably, then became the Rose McGowan of her time, seeking legal redress, first, through the DA's Office. District Attorney Buron Fitts, however, "had been elected to a third term in spite of an indictment for perjury in a rape case involving a 16-year-old girl (his acquittal caused a furor). Fitts counted [MGM Studios head] Louis B. Mayer as a close friend" and neglected to investigate. She then engaged attorney William J. F. Brown (15 May 1890 - 2 November 1967), and filed a lawsuit naming each of the guilty parties. An unrepentant MGM responded by launching one of the biggest cover-ups in Hollywood history, further brutalizing and marginalizing the young woman with concerted attempts to vilify her, using "perjury, bribes and smear tactics", at a time when MGM was the single largest employer in the County. (A posthumous apology for parking lot attendant Clement Soth's perjury was later issued by his children.)
Attorney Brown, too, quickly proved corrupt. Seeking to run for public office against Fitts, the support of MGM supplanted his duty, and Brown disgracefully abandoned his client's trial (by simply not showing up on several occasions, until the case was dismissed) to pursue his own (failed) ambition. Key witnesses were bribed or otherwise silenced by MGM, largely through the machinations of legendary MGM "fixers" Eddie Mannix and Howard Strickland.
Painful fallout: "After the dismissal of her federal case... 'I went from ‘Little Miss Innocent’ to a tramp. I did it to demean myself. I was worthless, a ‘fallen woman.’ Douglas married three times in five years, and two of her husbands were exposed as bigamists. 'All washed up with fellas' at 37, she has gone without relationships or sex ever since. 'I’ve never been in love,' she states flatly. 'And I’ve never had an orgasm. I was frigid.'"
"The lion raped, but Patricia Douglas was—and still is—the mouse that roared. Her heroic cry was once cruelly silenced; 66 years later, the last word is hers." (Quotes: David Stenn interview with Patsy, Vanity Fair, 2003.)
Patricia Dorothy Pauly (her legal name at the time of her death), preferred to be called Patsy in later life, and is the subject of David Stenn's 2003 Vanity Fair article, "It Happened One Night at MGM", and 2007 documentary film, "Girl 27".
Lest we forget. RIP, Brave Girl.
Defying the powerful studio, though the local police and physician, Dr. Edward Lindquist, would not, filing no reports and ruining evidence; Douglas, arguably, then became the Rose McGowan of her time, seeking legal redress, first, through the DA's Office. District Attorney Buron Fitts, however, "had been elected to a third term in spite of an indictment for perjury in a rape case involving a 16-year-old girl (his acquittal caused a furor). Fitts counted [MGM Studios head] Louis B. Mayer as a close friend" and neglected to investigate. She then engaged attorney William J. F. Brown (15 May 1890 - 2 November 1967), and filed a lawsuit naming each of the guilty parties. An unrepentant MGM responded by launching one of the biggest cover-ups in Hollywood history, further brutalizing and marginalizing the young woman with concerted attempts to vilify her, using "perjury, bribes and smear tactics", at a time when MGM was the single largest employer in the County. (A posthumous apology for parking lot attendant Clement Soth's perjury was later issued by his children.)
Attorney Brown, too, quickly proved corrupt. Seeking to run for public office against Fitts, the support of MGM supplanted his duty, and Brown disgracefully abandoned his client's trial (by simply not showing up on several occasions, until the case was dismissed) to pursue his own (failed) ambition. Key witnesses were bribed or otherwise silenced by MGM, largely through the machinations of legendary MGM "fixers" Eddie Mannix and Howard Strickland.
Painful fallout: "After the dismissal of her federal case... 'I went from ‘Little Miss Innocent’ to a tramp. I did it to demean myself. I was worthless, a ‘fallen woman.’ Douglas married three times in five years, and two of her husbands were exposed as bigamists. 'All washed up with fellas' at 37, she has gone without relationships or sex ever since. 'I’ve never been in love,' she states flatly. 'And I’ve never had an orgasm. I was frigid.'"
"The lion raped, but Patricia Douglas was—and still is—the mouse that roared. Her heroic cry was once cruelly silenced; 66 years later, the last word is hers." (Quotes: David Stenn interview with Patsy, Vanity Fair, 2003.)
Patricia Dorothy Pauly (her legal name at the time of her death), preferred to be called Patsy in later life, and is the subject of David Stenn's 2003 Vanity Fair article, "It Happened One Night at MGM", and 2007 documentary film, "Girl 27".
Lest we forget. RIP, Brave Girl.
Talented dancer Patricia Douglas was, in 1937, labelled number 27 of 120 underage chorus girls tricked into attending a stag party at a convention for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer visiting salesmen, who had, by then, been drinking heavily for three days. While trying to flee the scene; Patricia, a virgin tee-totaler, was violently abused and brutally raped by salesmen David Ross (who died of rectal cancer in 1962).
Defying the powerful studio, though the local police and physician, Dr. Edward Lindquist, would not, filing no reports and ruining evidence; Douglas, arguably, then became the Rose McGowan of her time, seeking legal redress, first, through the DA's Office. District Attorney Buron Fitts, however, "had been elected to a third term in spite of an indictment for perjury in a rape case involving a 16-year-old girl (his acquittal caused a furor). Fitts counted [MGM Studios head] Louis B. Mayer as a close friend" and neglected to investigate. She then engaged attorney William J. F. Brown (15 May 1890 - 2 November 1967), and filed a lawsuit naming each of the guilty parties. An unrepentant MGM responded by launching one of the biggest cover-ups in Hollywood history, further brutalizing and marginalizing the young woman with concerted attempts to vilify her, using "perjury, bribes and smear tactics", at a time when MGM was the single largest employer in the County. (A posthumous apology for parking lot attendant Clement Soth's perjury was later issued by his children.)
Attorney Brown, too, quickly proved corrupt. Seeking to run for public office against Fitts, the support of MGM supplanted his duty, and Brown disgracefully abandoned his client's trial (by simply not showing up on several occasions, until the case was dismissed) to pursue his own (failed) ambition. Key witnesses were bribed or otherwise silenced by MGM, largely through the machinations of legendary MGM "fixers" Eddie Mannix and Howard Strickland.
Painful fallout: "After the dismissal of her federal case... 'I went from ‘Little Miss Innocent’ to a tramp. I did it to demean myself. I was worthless, a ‘fallen woman.’ Douglas married three times in five years, and two of her husbands were exposed as bigamists. 'All washed up with fellas' at 37, she has gone without relationships or sex ever since. 'I’ve never been in love,' she states flatly. 'And I’ve never had an orgasm. I was frigid.'"
"The lion raped, but Patricia Douglas was—and still is—the mouse that roared. Her heroic cry was once cruelly silenced; 66 years later, the last word is hers." (Quotes: David Stenn interview with Patsy, Vanity Fair, 2003.)
Patricia Dorothy Pauly (her legal name at the time of her death), preferred to be called Patsy in later life, and is the subject of David Stenn's 2003 Vanity Fair article, "It Happened One Night at MGM", and 2007 documentary film, "Girl 27".
Lest we forget. RIP, Brave Girl.
Defying the powerful studio, though the local police and physician, Dr. Edward Lindquist, would not, filing no reports and ruining evidence; Douglas, arguably, then became the Rose McGowan of her time, seeking legal redress, first, through the DA's Office. District Attorney Buron Fitts, however, "had been elected to a third term in spite of an indictment for perjury in a rape case involving a 16-year-old girl (his acquittal caused a furor). Fitts counted [MGM Studios head] Louis B. Mayer as a close friend" and neglected to investigate. She then engaged attorney William J. F. Brown (15 May 1890 - 2 November 1967), and filed a lawsuit naming each of the guilty parties. An unrepentant MGM responded by launching one of the biggest cover-ups in Hollywood history, further brutalizing and marginalizing the young woman with concerted attempts to vilify her, using "perjury, bribes and smear tactics", at a time when MGM was the single largest employer in the County. (A posthumous apology for parking lot attendant Clement Soth's perjury was later issued by his children.)
Attorney Brown, too, quickly proved corrupt. Seeking to run for public office against Fitts, the support of MGM supplanted his duty, and Brown disgracefully abandoned his client's trial (by simply not showing up on several occasions, until the case was dismissed) to pursue his own (failed) ambition. Key witnesses were bribed or otherwise silenced by MGM, largely through the machinations of legendary MGM "fixers" Eddie Mannix and Howard Strickland.
Painful fallout: "After the dismissal of her federal case... 'I went from ‘Little Miss Innocent’ to a tramp. I did it to demean myself. I was worthless, a ‘fallen woman.’ Douglas married three times in five years, and two of her husbands were exposed as bigamists. 'All washed up with fellas' at 37, she has gone without relationships or sex ever since. 'I’ve never been in love,' she states flatly. 'And I’ve never had an orgasm. I was frigid.'"
"The lion raped, but Patricia Douglas was—and still is—the mouse that roared. Her heroic cry was once cruelly silenced; 66 years later, the last word is hers." (Quotes: David Stenn interview with Patsy, Vanity Fair, 2003.)
Patricia Dorothy Pauly (her legal name at the time of her death), preferred to be called Patsy in later life, and is the subject of David Stenn's 2003 Vanity Fair article, "It Happened One Night at MGM", and 2007 documentary film, "Girl 27".
Lest we forget. RIP, Brave Girl.
