Plastic Surgeon to the Stars in a Nip and Tuck Case

Slash and burn . . . Poking CBS in the eye . . . Adventures of Slam Man.

A $46-million defamation lawsuit against the plastic surgeon to the stars is dishing up the dirt about who among the rich and famous has had what nipped, lifted and tucked. The Los Angeles Superior Court complaint uses pseudonyms. But if this case ever reaches a courtroom, we could see some red faces--and the rosy glow won’t just be from the chemical peels.

Four former employees--including two scrub nurses who assisted at surgeries--are accusing Santa Monica surgeon Stephen Hoefflin of defaming them in a magazine story. Hoefflin is mired in a mud bath of lawsuits and countersuits, not to mention a hush-hush probe by the state medical board.

The women suing Hoefflin--Barbara Maywood, Kim Moore Mestas, Lydia Benjamin and Donna Burton--all testified before the medical board.

Their suit offers up juicy details of Hoefflin’s alleged hanky-panky inside and outside the operating room.

Among the lawsuit’s allegations: that the doctor charged one music celebrity for surgeries that weren’t performed; tipped off the tabloids when he had a celeb on the table; overprescribed Demerol for certain famous patients; parked sedated patients, especially those whose eyes were sutured shut for facial procedures, in a corridor by medical waste bins while charging them $450 a night for the recovery room; poked fun at his celebrity patients, often by exposing their private parts while they were unconscious; and left some of the surgical work to his minions--instead going out to lunch, buying Lotto tickets or sprawling on the floor of his office reading the National Enquirer, the Globe and Playboy.

Hoefflin denies any wrongdoing and says he is the victim of a smear campaign. In a prepared statement his lawyer, Richard Lloyd Sherman, called the former employees “disgruntled” and their charges “outrageous, insulting and total falsehoods.”

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CANDID CAMERA: The owner of the defunct Revival Cafe has sued CBS, local affiliate KCBS-TV Channel 2 and several station employees, charging that news reports last year on health code violations at Los Angeles eateries killed his once-thriving restaurant.

Paul Goldberg says the report placed his restaurant in a false light and drove away customers, forcing the business into bankruptcy. The Los Angeles Superior Court suit also alleges invasion of privacy, charging that the station planted an employee in the restaurant as a dishwasher and outfitted him with a hidden camera.

“The hidden camera is particularly insidious, because there is no right of rebuttal,” states the lawsuit, filed by attorney Neville Johnson. The targets of hidden camera reporting, the suit adds, are “effectively tried, convicted and sentenced in the equivalent of a ‘star chamber’ proceeding” before millions of viewers.

Goldberg is seeking air time on “60 Minutes” or “48 Hours” to set the record straight, as well as unspecified monetary damages.

KCBS spokeswoman Susan Neisloss said, “The lawsuit is completely without merit, and we will vigorously defend against it.”

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THE SLAM MAN CAN: Former boxing champ Sugar Ray Leonard is the original Slam Man, and he wants you to accept no substitute. Leonard has filed a suit in Los Angeles Superior Court against a company promoting a video for a rival boxing-style workout called “Tae Bo.”

Leonard contends in legal papers that an infomercial for the Tae Bo video is exploiting Leonard’s likeness without his permission. Because Leonard is retired from the ring and depends on that image to make a living, a competitor’s unauthorized use of his name and likeness could hurt him economically by giving him a bad reputation as a “rented personality,” according to the suit.

Attorney Garo Mardirossian said Leonard is trying to settle his dispute with Paul Monea and Universal Management Service Inc. prior to a hearing this week before Superior Court Judge David Yaffe. If the case isn’t settled, Leonard will seek a court order barring the use of his image in Tae Bo infomercials. Monea could not be reached for comment.

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REBUTTALS: Producer Tony Shepherd, who is involved in litigation over an allegedly botched production of the Miss Petite USA pageant, is not Aaron Spelling’s godson, Shepherd’s lawyer advises us.