Better a slap on the wrist than a cell phone to the head.
Naomi Campbell is hoping for the former for allegedly exacting the latter on Ana Scolavino, one of the ever-increasing legions of former employees accusing Campbell of being the boss from hell.
On Wednesday—just one day after being sued by a different former maid—the cover girl stood idly and quietly by in Manhattan Criminal Court for a five-minute hearing in which attorneys updated Judge Evelyn Laporte on the status of her long-gestating plea deal in the Scolavino matter.
Campbell is accused of hurling her phone at Scolavino last March during a spat over a pair of missing jeans.
"We're still in the process of working out a possible disposition," said Assistant District Attorney Shanda Strain, who asked for and received an extended restraining order against Campbell (and, presumably, any of her formidable telecommunication equipment) on behalf of Scolavino.
Campbell's lawyer, David Breitbart, is angling for his client to serve community service, preferably at a hospital near her apartment on the Upper East Side.
Breitbart told the judge he was pushing for a hospital or similarly enclosed location to spare his model client the sort of antagonistic—not to mention humiliating—experience endured by Boy George earlier this year. The '80s icon was given community service for falsely reporting a burglary at his apartment. His assignment: streetside garbage duty—a punishment that was chronicled, sweep for sweep, by hordes of paparazzi.
In addition to saving face, Breitbart said Campbell would simply be better suited to carry out her service—should that be her punishment—at a hospital, since she has routinely lent her famous visage to AIDS, cancer and similar charities.
"That's why it's so upsetting that someone who has devoted so much time to charity is being despotized," Breitbart said.
Adding to the despotization pile-on is Gaby Gibson, who worked as Campbell's maid for just three months before her employment ended in January. On Tuesday, Gibson added to the existing litany of allegations against her former boss by filing a lawsuit depicting the 36-year-old professional poser as a "violent superbigot" who routinely harassed Gibson over her Romanian ethnicity.
Gibson's claims of verbal abuse and defamation come after the dismissal of a complaint filed in June accusing Campbell of employment discrimination, civil assault and battery, as well as personal injury. Gibson's main grievances stem from an incident in which she says she was scouring Campbell's closet for yet another pair of missing jeans, only to be accused of stealing the denim and then kicked in the head by the model.
Breitbart has denied the allegations.
As for Scolavino's cell-phone-assault charges, Campbell is due back in court for sentencing Jan. 16, at which time she will either accept a plea deal or face being charged with second-degree assault. If convicted, she could face up to seven years in prison.