Ever since Shaun King of the New York Daily News rehashed a decades-old sexual assault situation allegedly involving then Tennessee Volunteers quarterback Peyton Manning, there has been a whole heck of a lot of debate regarding the two-time Super Bowl winner.
In short, King brought to the surface documents the scribe claimed was sent to him three days after Denver’s triumph over the Carolina Panthers in Super Bowl 50.
Among the claims, Manning is alleged to have assaulted Dr. Jamie Naughright, then a Director of Health & Wellness for the University of Tennessee’s men’s athletic program.
The report goes on to suggest that there was a widespread cover up from the university and those with close ties to Peyton, including his father, Archie.
Now comes this pretty damning report from ESPN’s “Outside the Lines” indicating that Naughright called a sexual assault crisis center in 1996 to report the alleged incident.
“Less than three hours after the Feb. 29, 1996, training room incident, then-trainer Jaime Naughright called a Knoxville sexual assault crisis center hotline and said she had been victimized that evening by a “very well-known public figure … an athlete at UT” and that she had already reported the incident to her supervisor.
According to the document, Naughright did not name Manning and did not want to discuss details of the assault over the phone because she “feared for her job, worried and feared for her life.” Notes written by the crisis center worker quote Naughright as saying, ‘I can’t believe this … sense there will be a cover-up.'”
As the report goes on to tell us, Manning was never the subject of a criminal investigation relating to the incident. It’s also important to note that Naughright did not name him in the phone call to the crisis center.
What makes this so interesting is that the documents were obtained within a court filing of thousands of pages involving a 2002 suit Naughright filed against the Manning’s claiming libel and defamation.
Also interesting is the fact that Naughright didn’t claim that the younger Manning made contact with her until she filed the aforementioned lawsuit in 2002, seven years after the incident.
It’s not yet known what all these revelations over the past couple weeks will mean for Manning from a legal standpoint. What we do know is that they do paint a darker picture of a player many had pegged as nothing less than a true All-American hero — the pie-eating, flag toting type of southern gentleman.