Voters back 'Idol' star in sex scandal

LOS ANGELES, Mar 2 (Reuters) Fans of ''American Idol,'' US TV's most popular program, gave their backing to a female contestant purportedly shown in some X-rated Internet photos, voting to keep her on the show.

''Idol'' fans have flooded online chat rooms and blogs in recent days buzzing over whether the photos really are of Antonella Barba and whether she'll get kicked off Fox network's singing contest because of them.

''Idol'' producers have shrugged off the controversy and no mention of the scandal was made during yesterday's show, when four of 20 remaining contestants were sent home.

But it was not until the end of the show that the fate of Barba was revealed, when the host called three women to the front of the stage to announce which one was out.

Barba, a 20-year-old former college student from New Jersey, was one of 20 competitors who last week advanced to the latest round, but some expected her to be voted off because of her mediocre singing and criticism from the judges.

But others said her lack of talent may not be that important at this stage of the show.

''If a sex tape of Antonella makes the Internet she could win this competition ... now that would be rather humorous,'' said entertainment news blog Bumpshack following the show.

The anonymously posted images include those of a young woman lying on her back covered in rose petals, posing in her underwear, sitting on a toilet and sitting among a group of topless women on a beach, hands over their breasts. Others show a woman performing oral sex on a man.

Though all are purported to be images of Barba, none of the subjects of the photos has been positively identified.

The episode was reminiscent of a similar scandal back in 2003, when contestant Frenchie Davis, whose powerhouse vocals dazzled the judges, was dismissed from the show following the discovery that she had posed topless on a porn site.

A spokesman for Fox, a unit of Rupert Murdoch's News Corp., said the network does ''not comment on the personal lives of our show participants.'' Nothing has been said on the show itself about the scandal.

Celebrity judge Simon Cowell and fellow producer Nigel Lythgoe said in separate media interviews this week Barba's future is entirely up to fans who vote on the contestants.

Appearing at a Playboy mansion party on Wednesday, Cowell said, ''I think it's disgraceful that so-called friends would sell these pictures. It's private property.'' Barba has kept mum about the photos. But her friend Amanda Coluccio, a fellow ''American Idol'' hopeful eliminated from the contest earlier this season, said only the least graphic photos are of Barba.

The more provocative pictures are of someone else, she told the New Jersey Star-Ledger.

''I've studied them. It's not her nose. She's never had (acrylic nail) tips in her life. She's the least slutty person I know,'' Coluccio was quoted as saying.

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