Kiss rocker Simmons facing defamation lawsuit

A woman who claims to be a former girlfriend of Kiss rocker Gene Simmons can proceed with a defamation lawsuit in which she says he made her sound like a “sex-addicted nymphomaniac” during a TV show, a judge in the US has ruled.

New York State Supreme Court Justice Rosalyn Richter denied Simmons’s motion to dismiss two of three claims by Georgeann Walsh Ward, 53, who says in court papers made public today that the rocker slandered her during a “rockumentary” about Kiss.

Ms Ward said in her lawsuit, filed in January, that photos of her appeared 11 times during the report on Kiss, which was shown on the VH-1 network several times in July and August.

In it, Simmons, who has been appearing on British TV screens in Channel 4’s Rock School, claimed to have had sexual encounters with 4,600 women.

The documentary, When Kiss Ruled The World, chronicled the band’s 30-year career, its impact on rock music and the quartet’s “wild” antics. The other band members were guitarist/singer Paul Stanley, drummer Peter Criss, and guitarist Ace Frehley.

Simmons says during the show, “There wasn’t a girl that was off limits, and I enjoyed every one of them”, Ms Ward’s court papers say.

At another point Simmons says, “I was a 24-hour whore. All I ever thought about was sex.” This, court papers say, was shown and followed by a photo of Ms Ward with Simmons.

Ms Ward’s papers say that because a photo of her with Simmons – though her name is never mentioned – was shown during remarks about his sexual adventures, she was in effect portrayed as “wild” and “unchaste.”

Judge Richter let stand Ms Ward’s two claims that she was depicted as unchaste or promiscuous during the documentary, even though she admitted to a “romantic” relationship with Simmons.