World News – A beauty pageant winner who was stripped of her Miss Delaware crown for being a few months too old is suing the Miss America organization, saying officials knew her age and disqualified her unfairly, court documents filed on Wednesday show.
The lawsuit filed in Delaware’s Court of Chancery by Amanda Longacre seeks $3 million in damages and her reinstatement as Miss Delaware so she can compete in the Miss America pageant in September.
She said she did nothing wrong and was honest when she applied to take part in the pageant, providing her birth certificate, driver’s license and other documents.
Rules for the pageant, the state preliminary for Miss America, require that contestants be no older than 24, and say they cannot turn 25 before the end of the year. Longacre’s 25th birthday will be on Oct. 22.
Longacre won the title on June 14, but was replaced in late June by the first runner-up, 23-year-old Brittany Lewis of Wilmington, Delaware.
— Reuters
