In a Utah courtroom on Friday, actress Gwyneth Paltrow testified during her US trial for a skiing accident, claiming that the guy who is suing her was to blame for the collision because he crashed into her from behind.
Terry Sanderson, a retired optometrist, is suing Paltrow for damages related to an accident she is accused of causing him while skiing seven years ago. According to Sanderson’s attorneys, the mishap cost him $3.3 million in losses.
In response, Paltrow countersued for a meager $1 plus legal fees, and she was given the opportunity to talk on the fourth day of the trial in Park City, a resort town in the Rocky Mountains.
“Mr. Sanderson categorically hit me on that ski slope, and that is the truth,” said Paltrow, under cross-examination by Sanderson’s lawyer.
“When he slid between my skis, I absolutely froze,” she recalled.
When Sanderson’s attorney questioned Paltrow about whether she yelled, “You skied straight into my effing back,” right after the incident, Paltrow said, “Yes, I did. I regret using foul language.
Which skier was further downslope when the accident happened is the issue at trial. They both allege being struck from behind.
Paltrow admitted to the court that she momentarily thought she was the victim of sexual attack.
“I was skiing, and two skis came between my skis, forcing my legs apart, and then there was a body pressing against me, and there was a very strange grunting noise” she said.
“So my brain was trying to make sense of what was happening. I thought, ‘Is this a practical joke? Is someone doing something perverted?'”
Oscar-winning actress Gwyneth Paltrow, her ex-husband, Coldplay artist Chris Martin, and their two children, Moses and Apple, were all traveling at the time of the accident.
At the trial, where Sanderson’s attorneys contend Paltrow left the scene of the collision, all three are expected to give testimony.
Paltrow acknowledged leaving the scene on Friday, but claimed her ski instructor Eric Christiansen, who was still there, had informed her she could.
