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Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2005

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  ``This was a frivolous lawsuit,'' Dan Webb, Smith's attorney, said Tuesday. ``I believe that Dr. Smith will simply want to put this behind him, go forward, get back to his medical career.''

Smith, 44, has denied the accusations and said that Audra Soulias demanded a $3 million payoff in exchange for not going to court. He said in a statement after the lawsuit was filed that ``family and personal history have made me unusually vulnerable to these kinds of charges.''

Soulias' attorney, Kevin E. O'Reilly, said he would refile the lawsuit with an amended complaint. He said Soulias was ``hurt'' the case was dismissed but ``happy it all came out.''

According to Soulias' lawsuit, Smith bought her drinks while she was celebrating her birthday in January 1999 and after taking her to his home, dragged her upstairs and assaulted her.

Consensual Sex With the 'Attacker'

O'Reilly has said Soulias, 28, never went to the police. He has described it as an assault that stopped short of sexual intercourse. He also has acknowledged that Soulias continued to work for Smith for the next six months and during that time had consensual sex with him on a number of occasions.

Soulias has said she would not have filed the suit had Smith not telephoned her in January 2004 and left voicemails, which she believed were intimidating.

Webb argued during the hearing that the two telephone calls could not have inflicted the extreme emotional distress required under Illinois law to file such a lawsuit. Judge William D. Maddux agreed.

In 1991, a Florida jury acquitted Smith of sexual assault and battery on a 30-year-old woman he'd met at a night club. He said his sexual relations with the woman had been consensual.

Smith's mother is former U.S. Ambassador to Ireland Jean Kennedy Smith, and he also is the nephew of the late President John Kennedy.

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