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- OregonLive.com 
"This is a case about hair," said attorney Leta Gorman.
More to the point, the case is about the hair that isn't on the head of Sarah Jane Ward, Gorman explained this week to a Clackamas County jury.
Ward, 36, is suing Rumi Simone, a high-class salon and spa in Lake Oswego, where a stylist bleached Ward's hair to the platinum shade that defined her signature look. She wants $50,000 for humiliation, depression and the cost of hair extensions.
Ward, who lives with her husband and two children in a $6 million mansion atop Lake Oswego's Iron Mountain, received three scalp bleaching treatments in fall 2007.
Not long after that, she says, disaster took root.
"Ms. Ward has had a bad hair day for the last 19 months," Gorman solemnly informed jurors.
When Ward showered, she noticed clumps of hair falling out. She thought she might be ill, possibly cancer-stricken, she testified. Within weeks, 70 percent of her hair snapped off, and she resorted to hair extensions.
"I felt ugly," Ward told jurors.
She said it will take at least two more years to regain the long tresses she had in 2007.
Ward, who had colored her hair for about 25 years, blames an inept stylist for the cosmetic catastrophe.
But Robert Scholz, an attorney representing the salon and stylist, said Ward is the one at fault. She failed to heed the advice of a hair-care professional and abused her hair in sundry ways, he said.
Hair has defined Ward's identity since childhood.
The daughter of a model, Ward started coloring her hair in fourth grade. "My mother told me my hair was dirty blond, and it wasn't attractive," she said.
Ward and her husband, John, testified that by the end of 2007 she was so distraught that she didn't want to leave the house and avoided holiday events.
"Is it your testimony that your children were denied seeing Santa because of your wife's hair breakage?" Scholz asked John Ward, skeptically.
Ward does not deserve money or much sympathy, Scholz told the court.
He offered the jury a brief primer on hair structure and the do's and don'ts of hair care, then claimed Ward ignored the stylist's recommendations and compounded the problem with teasing, hot-ironing and other unwise practices.
"Ms. Ward wanted a platinum look, a Marilyn Monroe look. That was the image she wanted," Scholz said.
And so, the dye was cast.
Ward was not physically harmed, did not go bald and did not suffer a mental health crisis, Scholz said. The salon shouldn't have to pay $8,500 for hair extensions and $546 for a baby sitter Ward hired while she visited her new stylist.
Rumi Simone "is not obligated to buy (Ward) a new look" or compensate her for humiliation and depression, Scholz said.
"We're dealing here with hair breakage," Scholz said. "It's not the end of the world."
The trial is expected to conclude today.
Then the jury starts splitting hairs.
-- Steve Mayes; stevemayes@news.oregonian.com
(I am not sure my link workes so I posted this way I am not sure if it was okay to copy and paste the article )
powers that be please edit as needed ;-)
"This is a case about hair," said attorney Leta Gorman.
More to the point, the case is about the hair that isn't on the head of Sarah Jane Ward, Gorman explained this week to a Clackamas County jury.
Ward, 36, is suing Rumi Simone, a high-class salon and spa in Lake Oswego, where a stylist bleached Ward's hair to the platinum shade that defined her signature look. She wants $50,000 for humiliation, depression and the cost of hair extensions.
Ward, who lives with her husband and two children in a $6 million mansion atop Lake Oswego's Iron Mountain, received three scalp bleaching treatments in fall 2007.
Not long after that, she says, disaster took root.
"Ms. Ward has had a bad hair day for the last 19 months," Gorman solemnly informed jurors.
When Ward showered, she noticed clumps of hair falling out. She thought she might be ill, possibly cancer-stricken, she testified. Within weeks, 70 percent of her hair snapped off, and she resorted to hair extensions.
"I felt ugly," Ward told jurors.
She said it will take at least two more years to regain the long tresses she had in 2007.
Ward, who had colored her hair for about 25 years, blames an inept stylist for the cosmetic catastrophe.
But Robert Scholz, an attorney representing the salon and stylist, said Ward is the one at fault. She failed to heed the advice of a hair-care professional and abused her hair in sundry ways, he said.
Hair has defined Ward's identity since childhood.
The daughter of a model, Ward started coloring her hair in fourth grade. "My mother told me my hair was dirty blond, and it wasn't attractive," she said.
Ward and her husband, John, testified that by the end of 2007 she was so distraught that she didn't want to leave the house and avoided holiday events.
"Is it your testimony that your children were denied seeing Santa because of your wife's hair breakage?" Scholz asked John Ward, skeptically.
Ward does not deserve money or much sympathy, Scholz told the court.
He offered the jury a brief primer on hair structure and the do's and don'ts of hair care, then claimed Ward ignored the stylist's recommendations and compounded the problem with teasing, hot-ironing and other unwise practices.
"Ms. Ward wanted a platinum look, a Marilyn Monroe look. That was the image she wanted," Scholz said.
And so, the dye was cast.
Ward was not physically harmed, did not go bald and did not suffer a mental health crisis, Scholz said. The salon shouldn't have to pay $8,500 for hair extensions and $546 for a baby sitter Ward hired while she visited her new stylist.
Rumi Simone "is not obligated to buy (Ward) a new look" or compensate her for humiliation and depression, Scholz said.
"We're dealing here with hair breakage," Scholz said. "It's not the end of the world."
The trial is expected to conclude today.
Then the jury starts splitting hairs.
-- Steve Mayes; stevemayes@news.oregonian.com
(I am not sure my link workes so I posted this way I am not sure if it was okay to copy and paste the article )
powers that be please edit as needed ;-)
at the end of the link 
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