Brunei - 1997

Shannon LaRhea Marketic (born January 14, 1971) is a beauty queen from Phoenix, Arizona who became Miss USA 1992. In 1997 she filed a lawsuit against a prince of the ruling family of Brunei, alleging that he had compelled her into performing sexual acts for guests at a party he organized.
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In 1997, Marketic filed a lawsuit against the ruling family of Brunei for $90 million. In the case, Shannon alleges that she and 6 other young women were paid $127,200 each for a modeling job in Brunei (whereas on the ABC news program "20/20", Marketic said she was supposed to provide "intellectual conversations" with visiting guests of the royal family).

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These other women include, Miss United Kingdom runner up Paula Bradbury and former Miss Teen USA and future Miss USA, Brandi Sherwood.

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Marketic maintained that she and the women were held as"sex slaves" and were "intimidated and coerced into performing physically and morally repulsive acts of prostitution." They were apparently ordered to dance for 5-6 hours every night at parties during which their bodies and private parts were groped and grabbed by men. During the dances Shannon was also allegedly abused verbally with comments made about her 'real' breasts. The women were often told to go with a man to have "tea" with him and then had sex with him.

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In her interview on "20/20", Marketic said that after 32 days of being held against her will, she managed to smuggle a letter out to the US Embassy; shortly afterwards, she was allegedly paid $10,000 and forced to fly back to the United States alone.

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The case was thrown out due to the immunity of the ruling family as heads of state.

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There has been no further investigation into this case although there are allegations both supporting and refuting her claims. Paula Bradbury separately sued the Sultan and won 500,000 pounds in settlement.