NYC- A Manhattan shrink who touts his expertise in interviewing is being sued by a model who accused him of getting too hands-on when she went looking for work.
Ana Sola [pictured] charges in Manhattan Supreme Court that psychologist William Swan tried to grope her “in a menacing and lustful manner” during an interview.
Sola, 35, went to the shrink’s Lexington Ave. office in July 2002 in search of a part-time job after Swan had advertised for help for a program designed to relax victims of sexual abuse.
In sworn testimony, she described how Swan, author of the book “How to Pick the Right People,” allegedly pawed at her after she had wrapped herself in a towel to sample his methods of massage.
When she asked Swan to knock it off, he allegedly started “to talk in his psychological way of talking about my subconscious mind and my issues,” Sola said.
“He asked me what my comfort level was and I said, ‘Minus 12,'” she added.
But Swan insisted he never laid a hand on the prospective hire and accused her of trying to sell him on a “spiced-up” relaxation technique, belittling his method as “boring.”
When Swan showed no interest in her ideas – which included more intimate touching – Sola allegedly lectured him for being too timid.
An attorney for Swan – whose company, Swan Consultants, claims Merrill Lynch, Dunkin’ Donuts and the U.S. Navy as clients – failed this week to convince a judge that the shrink is the victim of a shakedown.
Justice Doris Ling-Cohan said Sola’s claim could proceed to trial even after Swan attorney Jack Dweck argued, “There is no need for a trial because there is nothing to try.”
In a deposition last year, Swan pointed out how Sola started peddling nude pictures of herself on the Internet shortly after her aborted job interview. The pictures show her posing “au naturel” in a tree.
“The plaintiff is no babe in the woods,” Swan said.