Jury weighs whether photographer guilty of Cameron Diaz topless snaps

0 Comments | AFP, July, 2005

LOS ANGELES (AFP) — A photographer who tried to sell Hollywood star Cameron Diaz topless pictures taken of her when she was an unknown model is a "con artist" who had hoped for a "quick payoff," prosecutors said.

A jury in Los Angeles began weighing photographer John Rutter's guilt after prosecutor David Walgren told the jury in Los Angeles that he had targeted the blonde bombshell for a three-million-dollar blackmail scam.

"She was ... the target of his scam and his con ... He's hoping for a quick payoff, a very quick payoff by ratcheting up the pressure," the prosecutor said before the jury began deliberating on Rutter's fate.

Rutter is accused of presenting Diaz with a forged model release form apparently bearing her signature when he offered to sell her...