Oprah slapped with suit
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This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from February 1997.
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Randolph L. Cook of Columbus is seeking $20 million in punitivedamages for slander and emotional distress. The Columbus Dispatch said Cook filed the suit on 16 January in US District Court in Chicago, where Winfrey's show is based.
Cook, 39, claims in the lawsuit that he and the talk-show host who topped the latest Forbes magazine list of the world's 40 best-paid entertainers with a 1995-96 income of $171 million - lived together in Chicago between January and May 1985, and abused drugs together during that period.
Cook said he planned to sell the rights to his story, but Winfrey blocked those opportunities.
Winfrey flatly denies all of the allegations in Cook's lawsuit, according to a motion filed by her attorney to bar Cook from commenting on the lawsuit.
A telephone message seeking additional comment was left Friday at Winfrey's Harpo Productions.
In a show taped in January 1995, Winfrey acknowledged she had used cocaine.
She said she used drugs as part of her relationship with a boyfriend and that the drug use ended with the relationship. She said the drug use occurred while she was an anchorwoman, a job she held from 1973 to 1976 in Nashville, Tennessee.
