On Thursday, David Portnoy, the president of digital media company Barstool Sports, turned to Twitter to reply to a Business Insider investigation into three women’s complaints of “violent and humiliating” sexual encounters.
Portnoy, 44, allegedly choked two of the women and filmed the interactions without their permission, according to two of the victims. “It was so hard I felt like I was being raped,” one woman emailed a pal two days after having sex with Portnoy.
“I was trying to get away, and he was like, ‘Stop running away from me,’” the woman told a friend. ‘Please don’t run away from me.’ “As a matter of policy, we do not comment on the private lives of our employees,” a Barstool Sports representative said in a statement to Variety, “but we take this problem seriously and are actively monitoring it.”
Portnoy called the Business Insider post a “hit job” in video tweets. “I’m simply going to tell it like it is and shoot from the hip,” Portnoy stated, alleging he was ignoring legal advice.
Portnoy said in two films totaling around 12 minutes that he was never approached by authorities and that he has never been charged with a crime.
The Business Insider reporter, according to Portnoy, had a “narrative.” He said he was aware of the probe months before it began when women contacted him about a reporter inquiring about their sexual experiences with Portnoy.
“[The probe] hasn’t a shred of credibility,” he remarked.
He admitted to having a brief relationship with both ladies. He also sent and received text messages.
“I’ve never done anything strange with a girl, nothing even close to non-consensual,” he claimed.
“Mildly afraid but genuinely relieved to have spoken for the first time about my Barstool experience, 5 years later,” Ali Weiss, one of the women included in the story, wrote on Twitter. LFG, this is only the beginning. @thisisinsider @mjnblack, thank you.”