Defense attorney Aaron Sadock (right) and Daniel Kaplan (center) represent BLL Media Inc., the company that operates GirlsDoPorn.com. George Rikos (left) represents co-defendant DOMI Publications LLC. (Photo: John Gibbins/The San Diego Union Tribune)

Jane Doe 1 says GirlsDoPorn.com has made her life miserable. The chief accuser among 22 women who are suing the company for publicizing their adult videos testified Thursday that the experience has killed her interest in a legal career, destroyed romantic relationships and even led to two suicide attempts.

Lawyers for the company that owns the website put her through another gauntlet in San Diego Superior Court. On cross-examination they painted the picture of a high roller who once lived rent-free at a Las Vegas resort and who posts to social media about trips around the world and spa days in Beverly Hills.

Under questioning from Daniel Kaplan of the Law Offices of Daniel A. Kaplan, Doe acknowledged that she was living at the Palm Hotel in Las Vegas at the time she negotiated to film the first of three adult videos in 2015.

"You stayed for free, isn't that correct?" Kaplan asked.

Doe said that a friend, hotel owner George Maloof, had "comped" her room for five weeks while she focused on an internship at a local law firm.

"You were working there as a prostitute, weren't you?" Kaplan asked,

That led to a momentary uproar in Judge Kevin Enright's courtroom. "This is outrageous!" plaintiff attorney Ed Chapin of Sanford Heisler Sharp shouted. "He has absolutely no evidence of that."

Enright sustained the objection, but Doe spoke up anyway. "The answer is no," she said. "I worked at a law firm, and I worked really hard there."

The women allege that GirlsDoPorn persuaded them to shoot the videos by promising the content would be distributed only to private collectors who live overseas. Not only did the videos appear on GirlsDoPorn, a subscription-only website, but portions were published on popular free websites such as Pornhub. The actress' personal information appeared on the website Porn WikiLeaks, leading to what the women describe as severe harassment in their personal and professional lives. Chapin has said the goal of the lawsuit is for "their business model not to be viable in the future."

BLL Media Inc., the company that owns GirlsDoPorn, says it never made such promises. In fact, the plaintiffs signed written contracts and made videotaped statements that explicitly grant BLL the right of unlimited distribution of their likenesses "throughout the world in perpetuity, without limitations," the company says.

The case is being tried without a jury in front of Enright.

Jane Doe 1 testified Thursday that, within weeks of threatening to sue GirlsDoPorn in 2015, pictures of herself, information about her family and employer, and links to her social media accounts appeared on Porn Wikileaks. Strangers started propositioning her via text message. One emailed the student body president of her law school, asking if there were "any other girls of the bar who want to shoot a video."

A Facebook user going by the name Ann Fairchild sent harassing messages to Doe, her sister, her employer and her undergraduate soccer coach, Doe said. She testified that she believed "Ann Fairchild" to be a fake account operated by BLL Media owner Michael Pratt. Now it was Kaplan's turn to object, saying the plaintiffs had made no offer of proof of such a connection. Chapin said he's going to present a cybersleuthing expert who will testify it "probably" was Pratt. Enright said he'll reserve judgment.

The experience has left her feeling "ripped apart piece by piece," she testified, causing severe anxiety and paranoia. "It's like something I can never really get away from," she said.

Though she passed the bar in 2017, Doe said she decided against practicing law. "Anyone who hires me is going to Google my name," she said. "It comes up with all these horrible articles and videos." Instead she works as a waitress.

Kaplan began his cross by clarifying that a harassing phone call that Doe said she'd received just Wednesday on her way to the courtroom was an incoming message with no ID. "So you didn't pick up the phone" on that call, he asked. That was correct, Doe said.

Kaplan then presented a series of pictures from Doe's Instagram Stories account, taken after the GirlsDoPorn videos became public, showing her enjoying trips to London; Gstaad, Switzerland; Cabo San Lucas, Colombia; Steamboat Springs, Colorado; and Beverly Hills, California.

Chapin questioned the relevance of one photo. "I'm just trying to establish that her life is not ruined," Kaplan said.

Kaplan also elicited that Doe has appeared on behalf of clients in San Diego Superior Court. Doe said it was less than five times, when she was employed as a paralegal by a small law firm.

"And you used your real name?" Kaplan asked.

"I had to," Doe said.

Then came the question about prostitution. Chapin said there was no good-faith basis for the question because the defendants hadn't cleared it through discovery. He charged that Andre Garcia, the actor who helped recruit Doe for the films, is behind the question. Doe had testified Wednesday that Garcia tried to coach her to make the claim in her film, but she'd refused because it wasn't true. "If they have somebody, they're sandbagging us," Chapin said. "And I want to know who it is."

Kaplan argued that Doe had opened the door with her testimony about Garcia, who he said is not testifying because of plaintiff threats of criminal prosecution. "There's a lot of trial left," Kaplan said. "This doesn't seem like the time to attack the questions on a good-faith basis, which I have."

Enright ordered the parties to meet and confer about the evidentiary basis. He said it's a serious allegation, and reminded the attorneys that they're officers of the court.

Kaplan proceeded to cross-examine Doe about a photo of her on board a private jet in 2016. Doe acknowledged it was her but said she couldn't remember who paid for the flight or where she had traveled. "Maybe my boyfriend?" she said.

"Shall I move on, ma'am, if you don't remember?" Kaplan replied.

The proceedings ended with a testy courtroom meet-and-confer in which the parties discussed a last-minute deposition of BLL owner Pratt.