“The Invention of Anna” Trial: Friend Wants Journalist Devey Story Notes

In court filings this week, Netflix lawyers revealed that Williams’ lawyers want to obtain Pressler’s private journalistic notes. Pressler, in a statement, said handing over the files would cause sources to distrust her and other journalists in the future.

“Maintaining such confidentiality is essential to my role as a journalist, and my ability to report will be significantly impaired if I am forced to disclose my newsgathering material,” Pressler wrote in a court filing.

“Inventing Anna” tells the story of how Sorokin, using the name Anna Delvey, defrauded Manhattan’s elite by impersonating a European heiress with a fortune of $40 million. Williams, who is portrayed using her real name, is a prominent character in the series as Sorokin’s closest friend.

According to Williams’ lawsuit, Netflix defamed her by portraying her as an opportunistic partner who was happy to siphon money, clothes and vacations from Sorokin’s fake generosity — rather than a friend who was duped.

Sorokin stuck Williams with a $60,000 American Express bill from a group vacation to Morocco, though the company later reimbursed the charges. Williams later wrote a book, My Friend Anna, in which she recounted the panic and psychological damage of discovering that her supposed close friend was, in fact, a con artist, and the worry that she would lose her job as a photo editor for Vanity. Correct. HBO has also acquired the rights to Williams’ story — which she partially recounted in an article for the magazine — but there are no public indications that the project is in development.

In a 2019 criminal trial, a Manhattan jury found Sorokin guilty of stealing from banks and other institutions as part of her scam, but acquitted her of charges that she stole from Williams. She was released from prison in 2021 and was then promptly rearrested by Immigration and Customs Enforcement, who attempted to deport her to Germany, where her family lives. Sorokin, who is fighting both deportation and an appeal in her criminal case, was released from house arrest in August, her immigration attorney previously told BI. This week, she’s hosting several New York Fashion Week shows in collaboration with Pornhub and clothing brand Shao. She is scheduled to appear on the upcoming season of ABC’s “Dancing With the Stars.”

Netflix waived reporter’s privilege once it used the notes for “Inventing Anna,” Williams’ lawyers argue.

On Oct. 4, Sorokin — who sold her Lifetime adaptation rights to “Inventing Anna” — is scheduled to testify for a deposition in Williams’ lawsuit against Netflix. U.S. District Judge Colm Connolly, who is overseeing the case in federal court in Delaware (and who himself was once portrayed in the TV movie “And Never Let Her Go”), in March refused to dismiss the case entirely and allowed go into the discovery phase.

Journalists in the United States are often protected by some form of reporter’s privilege, a legal doctrine that preserves the right not to be compelled to disclose information in court.

Pressler, in her court filing, wrote that her New York magazine article about Sorokin raised important questions about elite institutions and “how our culture celebrates wealth.”

“I believe my article raised issues of public interest, namely examining how a young woman could work her way into the rooms of the most elite and convince those in the banking, fashion and art worlds that she was not,” she wrote .

In letters obtained by BI, attorneys representing Williams argued that Netflix waived any legal protections by sharing Pressler’s notes with various members of the “Inventing Anna” production team.

“Netflix has asserted privilege over an incredibly wide range of documents, including draft scripts, production schedules distributed to the entire cast and crew, and many other documents written by someone other than Ms. Pressler,” said Williams’ attorney, Alexander Rufus-Isaacs. for BI. in an email. “Our position is that by sharing this information so widely, Netflix has waived reporter’s privilege.”

Pressler declined to comment. A lawyer for Netflix referred questions to a company spokesman, who did not respond to requests for comment. (Some of Netflix’s lawyers in the case, from the law firm Davis Wright Tremaine, also represent Business Insider in disputes unrelated to the First Amendment.) Representatives of the magazine’s New York-based parent company, Vox Media, did not they immediately responded to requests for comment.

In court filings, Netflix lawyers say there is plenty of precedent for applying New York’s reporter protection law to adaptive works because the original purpose of the reporting was for a magazine article.

Pressler also wrote in her statement that “Inventing Anna” will “use my news to further publicize these matters of public concern — and answer these questions about who is a victim, who is a scammer, and who should be celebrated to another audience. “

“It does not matter that these newsgathering materials were later used to create a dramatized series — Ms. Pressler and Netflix have an unqualified right under New York law to maintain the protection of the identities of these confidential sources — which were originally procured as part of of the lady. Pressler’s writing process,” Netflix lawyers wrote in a filing.