Matt Lauer accuser Brooke Nevils details allegations in new essay
Brooke Nevils, a former NBC talent assistant, is speaking out against Matt Lauer in a new personal essay.
Former “Today” anchor Matt Lauer made a rare sighting in New York nearly two months after former NBC talent assistant Brooke Nevils publicly recounted her alleged sexual assault in 2017.
Lauer, 68, was spotted with girlfriend Shamin Abas after dinner on March 23 in the Long Island village of Sag Harbor, according to People.
A photo shared by People shows Lauer wearing a light grayish jacket with a dark baseball cap pulled low, while Abas is seen wearing a dark coat with a fur‑lined hood. It was the first time the former TV personality was photographed since November, People reported.
In a vulnerable piece for The Cut, published Jan. 28, Nevils not only discussed the alleged assault, which she said occurred in Sochi, Russia, during NBC’s coverage of the Olympic Games, but explained why she didn’t report it to law enforcement.
“One strikingly clear thought crossed my mind and then was instantly struck from my consciousness: If anyone else had done this to me, I would have gone to the police,” Nevils wrote in the piece, recalling when she woke up in a hotel room in pain with blood on the sheets. “In the news business back then, his point of view was reality, and if you disagreed with it, you were wrong.”
At the time, Lauer was the longest-running host of the “Today” show with a reported multimillion-dollar contract. Nevils said she felt trapped as she was in a foreign country known for surveillance, surrounded by only other NBC employees and an NBC-employed doctor to consult.
“I was surrounded by people whose careers, like mine, were dependent upon Matt’s success,” she wrote. “Good quarterbacks have short memories, I told myself. Good soldiers fight another day. Good girls don’t make a fuss.”
Lauer has maintained that the sexual encounter with Nevils was consensual and denied wrongdoing. He has faced multiple accusations and has not faced any criminal charges.
When was Matt Lauer fired?
After a 20-year tenure co-anchoring the “Today” show, Lauer was fired in November 2017 due to a complaint of “inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace.”
Following his termination from the NBC morning talk show, Variety published the results of a two-month investigation focusing on three women who identified themselves as victims of alleged sexual harassment by Lauer.
The outlet reported that “work and sex were intertwined” for Lauer and that the anchor allegedly regularly invited women to his hotel room while covering the Olympics over the years, as well as to his secluded office within 30 Rockefeller Center in New York City.
In a statement to the Associated Press at the time, Lauer said “some of what is being said about me is untrue or mischaracterized, but there is enough truth in these stories to make me feel embarrassed and ashamed.”
Contributing: Anna Kaufman and Edward Segarra, USA TODAY