Jill and Kent Easter were charged with felony false imprisonment for planting drugs in the car of a woman who ran the PTA at their son’s school in Orange County. Picture: Orange County District Attorney’s Office.

Just replace Newport Beach with Irvine, another affluent city in Orange County, and Harbor School with Plaza Vista Middle School.

Sub out the scheming Julie Cooper-Nichol with Jill Easter, whose son attended Plaza Vista, and you’ve got all you need for a schoolyard spat gone wrong.

So how did a petty squabble in 2010 between Jill Easter and school volunteer Kelli Peters land Easter and her ex-husband Kent in jail?

And what compelled an Orange County court to last week award Mrs Peters $US5.7 million ($AU8.9 million) in damages?

Here’s what went down.

The cast of The O.C. Adam Brody (Seth Rogen), Rachel Bilson (Summer Roberts), Benjamin McKenzie (Ryan Atwood), Peter Gallagher (Sandy Cohen), Mischa Barton (Marissa Cooper), Kelly Roawn (Kirsten Cohen), Alan Dale (Caleb Nichol), Tate Donovan (Jimmy Cooper) and Melinda Clarke (Julie Cooper).Source:Supplied

Melinda Clarke as Marissa’s selfish, scheming mother, Julie Cooper, on The O.C.Source:Supplied

1. Volunteer Kelli Peters accidentally insults Jill Easter

On Feb. 16, 2010, Mrs Peters was supervising the after-school tennis program at Plaza Vista.

Mrs Peters was the president of the school’s Parent Teacher Association, which is kind of like the P & C in Australia, but more hands-on and formalised.

Mrs Easter drove to the school to pick up her son from tennis practice, but when she got there, she noticed that he wasn’t waiting out the front like he normally did.

Mrs Easter blamed Mrs Peters for her son’s lateness. Mrs Peters hit back and said her son was “slow to line up”.

“I believe Mrs. Peters said, ‘You’re being slow,’ like falling behind in line, and I think the Easters took it as [Peters was saying] their son was being mentally slow,” Charles Shaver from the Irvine Police Department told US ABC News.

“She thought her son had been crying because the tennis coach had done something to him, and the fact was her son was crying because she was late to pick him up, in my opinion,” Mrs Peters told ABC. “I said, ‘He didn’t line up fast enough. Maybe he just walked slow.’”

Kelli Peters. Picture: ABC News.Source:Supplied

2. Mrs Easter launches an attack on Mrs Peters

Jill Easter and her husband Kent, lawyers who both graduated from prestigious US law schools, launched a campaign against Mrs Peters.

They made an official complaint to the principal and accused Mrs Peters of deliberately abandoning their son.

“They attempted to have me removed from the school, removed from any Irvine school, never to volunteer again,” Mrs Peters said. “Banished. Completely banished.

“[They] filed lawsuits against me ... a restraining order. She told the judge that I tried to kill her and that I was stalking her. … I mean they just went on to torture me for a really long time,” she said.

Kelli Peters. Picture: ABC News.Source:Supplied

3. The Easters plant drugs in Peters’ car

One year later in February 2011, Kent Easter made a phone call to local police under a fake name, accusing Mrs Peters of hiding drugs in her car.

“I was calling because my daughter is a student at Plaza Vista Elementary School,” Mr Easter told police over the phone, using the fake name ‘Vijay Chandrasekhar’.

“I’m concerned that one of the parent volunteers there may be under the influence or using drugs. I just had to go over to the school and I saw a car driving very erratically.”

He continued: “I saw them get out and it looked like they had something in their car behind the seat. Drugs. I recognised the woman as the parent volunteers for the after school program. I'm concerned that there are drugs at the school.”

Police were called to the school and found a large bag of marijuana and a bag of Percocet and a bag of Vicodin — two painkillers prescribed for severe pain — in the back seat of Mrs Peters’ car.

Officer Shaver said Mrs Peters cried “hysterically” as police searched her car.

“They put it up on top of the police car for everybody to see, which was really hard, because I kept thinking, ‘My daughter’s getting out any minute,’” Mrs Peters said.

“And I’m just thinking the whole world is looking at this right now … no one’s ever going to get this image out of their head.

“I said, ‘Please put the drugs away. You’re going to find out they’re not mine and you’re going ruin my life anyway.’”

When asked if she knew of anyone who would want to frame her, Mrs Peters instantly named Jill Easter.

Ken Easter takes the stand in court. Picture: ABC News.Source:Supplied

4. Kent and Jill Easter are arrested, charged and sent to jail

After police traced the “Vijay Chandrasekhar” call to a Newport Beach hotel near Kent Easter’s law firm, and found his DNA on the drugs planted in Mrs Peters’ car, they arrested him and Mrs Easter.

The couple were found guilty of felony false imprisonment. Mrs Easter entered a guilty plea while Mr Easter fought the charge and the case went to trial.

Mr Easter’s lawyer Tom Bienert argued his client was coerced by his wife to inform police about the drugs she planted in Peters’ car.

“Kent Easter was a trusting husband, what he wasn’t was a standup to his wife,” Mr Bienert told a court in 2013, The LA Times reported.

“By the end of the trial, you will see that Kent was a good human being who didn’t have a backbone against his wife, she wore the pants in the family.”

He added: “Everything here was under the control of Jill Easter. There is nothing here that couldn’t have been used and, in fact, wasn’t used by her.”

But he later admitted to planting the drugs

“You planted drugs in Kelli Peters’ car and tried to get her arrested?” asked Rob Marcereau, Mrs Peters’ lawyer.

“Very stupidly, and unfortunately, yes,” Mr Easter replied.

Mr Easter spent 86 days in jail and his now ex-wife was there for 60 days, according to The Washington Post.

Jill Easter outside a courtroom. Picture: ABC News.Source:Supplied

5. Kelli Peters is awarded $US5.7 million ($AU8.9 million) in damages

Last Friday, an Orange County Superior Court jury ruled that the Easters acted with malice, oppression or fraud in their actions against Mrs Peters.

Mrs Peters said her win wasn’t about the money.

“This was about standing up to people that pick on other people and telling them it’s not okay to do this. I feel like justice has been served,” she told the Orange County Register.

Mrs Peters said the couple has never expressed any remorse.

“I think saying sorry goes a long way,” she said. “It would have gone a long way with me in the beginning. I wouldn’t have gone this far had they said they were sorry.”