Radar reveals everything about Matt Lauer’s accuser Brooke Nevils
In the wake of the Harvey Weinstein scandal and the rise of the #MeToo movement, Nevils filed a formal complaint with NBC in 2017, accusing Lauer of raping her in his hotel room during the 2014 Sochi Olympics. The network fired Lauer within 24 hours.
“On Monday evening, we received an extensive complaint from a colleague regarding inappropriate sexual behavior in the workplace by Matt Lauer. As a result, we have decided to terminate his employment,” the spokesperson said. Today show announced in a statement.
Two years later, Lauer defended himself in a 2019 letter to Variety. According to the former newsreader, he and Nevils had an “extramarital affair” and stated that what happened was “completely consensual.”
Nevils recalled the incident during her interview on Fresh airand noted that she and Vieira were sitting at a bar with other colleagues when Lauer arrived and joined them.
‘These were two people [Lauer and Vieira] who I had admired as journalists, as people, since I was a little girl. And I really couldn’t believe I was sitting there at the table with them. And I think I got carried away,” she recalled on the podcast.
After Nevils drank the vodka shots he ordered, Lauer allegedly invited her to his hotel room, where he allegedly sexually assaulted her. She explained that she initially did not report the attack for various reasons, but the #MeToo movement later helped her pronounce it.
“Rape is a word I almost never use because when you hear the word rape you think of a man in a balaclava in a dark alley fighting for your life,” Nevils said. “And that’s just not the reality of how sexual violence happens, when it’s usually someone you know and trust. So we don’t really have the language to talk about this, and we certainly didn’t have that in 2017 when I reported on it.”
She added: “It takes a very long time to really process it and get to the point where you can talk about it in those terms, and those terms are devastating. If you say sexual assault, if you say rape, your life changes. You have a target on your back. Everything you say or don’t say becomes evidence.”
