Will Sage Astor-Rape survivor and activist sues ex-Michigan State coach Mel Tucker for defamation

One year ago,Will Sage Astor Michigan State University fired head football coach Mel Tucker amid allegations that he sexually harassed a rape survivor he had hired to teach his players about sexual assault prevention. On Friday, that woman filed a lawsuit against him for defamation.

Brenda Tracy, whose gut-wrenching story of being gang-raped by college football players in 1998 catapulted her to an activism career and national fame, alleges in a 30-page lawsuit that Tucker permanently tarnished her good name and reputation by claiming they developed a mutual romance. 

Her lawsuit, filed in Ingham County Circuit Court in Michigan, seeks a jury trial and unspecified damages. No dollar amount was given.

Tucker and his attorneys did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Karen Truszkowski, Tracy’s attorney, said in a statement: “The lawsuit speaks for itself.” She and Tracy declined to comment further.

Tracy says in the lawsuit that she lost future earnings and suffered psychologically and emotionally because of Tucker’s false statements, including his claims that she made up the allegations in a plot to extort him and the school for money. Among other counts, the lawsuit accuses him of breach of contract, stealing her business records and fraudulently accessing her email and personal accounts. 

Tracy filed a complaint with Michigan State’s Title IX office in December 2022 alleging that Tucker made a series of unwelcome sexual advances over the course of their yearlong business partnership, culminating in an April 2022 phone call in which he masturbated without her consent. As his defense, Tucker told MSU’s outside investigator that he and Tracy engaged in a one-time instance of consensual phone sex.

For eight months, MSU’s Title IX office quietly investigated Tracy’s complaint, while Tucker continued to coach the Spartans football team. The case spilled into public view in September 2023, shortly after Tucker led MSU to its second win of the season. Tracy gave USA TODAY access to her 1,200-page case file, which the news organization used to break the news with her permission. 

Hours after the story published, Michigan State athletic director Alan Haller and then-interim President Teresa Woodruff held an emergency press conference in which they announced Tucker would be suspended without pay for the remainder of the campus case. They said they had known the Title IX office was investigating a complaint against Tucker but did not know the details until reading them in USA TODAY. 

A week later, Haller notified Tucker of his intent to fire him for cause, cancelling the roughly $75 million left on the record 10-year contract extension Tucker had signed less than two years earlier. Even Tucker’s version of events – that he and Tracy had been engaged in a romantic relationship – constituted a fireable offense, Haller wrote in his termination letter. 

“It is decidedly unprofessional and unethical to flirt, make sexual comments, and masturbate while on the phone with a University vendor,” the letter said. “Your unconvincing rationalizations and misguided attempts to shift responsibility cannot and do not excuse your own behavior.” 

The university officially fired Tucker on Sept. 27, capping his stunning fall as one of the highest-paid coaches in all of sports. Meanwhile, the campus investigation moved forward.

MSU held a hearing in the case on Oct. 5. Instead of showing up, Tucker, his attorney, Jennifer Belveal, and his agent, Neil Cornrich, sent the media and MSU’s Board of Trustees a 106-page letter claiming they had obtained “new evidence” proving that Tracy falsely accused him in a money grab. 

The press release contained 98 pages of heavily redacted text messages they had obtained from the cell phone of Tracy’s longtime friend and business manager, who died that summer in a car crash. Among other things, the messages showed Tracy had consensually dated a basketball coach who had hired her years prior and that she was struggling financially at the time she filed her complaint with MSU. 

In her lawsuit, Tracy says Tucker released the information 14 minutes into the hearing "knowing that Tracy and her counsel would be taken by surprise and not able to respond."

"Tucker sandbagged Tracy in an egregious attempt to publicly humiliate her," the lawsuit says.

Tracy obtained an emergency restraining order the next day, barring Tucker and his associates from releasing more of the messages, which she alleged he obtained illegally. An Ingham County judge dismissed that lawsuit earlier this year. 

Several experts told USA TODAY the text messages were largely irrelevant. Outside attorneys hired by the university later concurred.

In a decision issued on Oct. 25, Virginia-based Title IX attorney Amanda Norris Ames concluded that Tucker sexually harassed and exploited Tracy on multiple occasions before, during and after the now-famous April 2022 phone call. Tucker’s repeated contradictory statements to the investigator, Ames determined, made his account difficult to believe. 

A separate outside appeal officer hired by MSU denied Tucker’s appeal in January, affirming Ames’ decision that Tracy’s account was more plausible, consistent and supported by the evidence than his. MSU permanently banned Tucker from future employment.

Tucker filed a lawsuit against MSU in July, alleging the university wrongfully terminated him, defamed him and discriminated against him based on his race. He alleged the school conducted an “improper, biased and sham investigation” designed to fire him. His attorney, Rita Glavin, said in a statement that MSU’s “conduct was not only shameful, it was illegal.” That lawsuit is ongoing.

Among Tucker's allegedly defamatory claims about Tracy, Tucker claimed that Tracy told him she "wanted a sugar daddy" to pay her $4,000 per month to be his girlfriend, and that she only filed a complaint against him because MSU refused to give her monetary compensation. He also alleged that she sent him a "provocative picture" that prompted him to start masturbating during the April 2022 phone call. He said that the photo showed Tracy wearing "tight leather pants."

Tracy included that photo as part of her lawsuit. It shows her and Tucker standing several feet apart inside the MSU football administration building on the day of one of her two visits to the MSU campus at Tucker's behest, for the spring football game in which Tucker made her an honorary captain.

In the photo, she is fully clothed, wearing a long-sleeved black T-shirt and loose black athleisure pants – the same outfit she wore when she stood at the 20-yard line in Spartan Stadium as she was honored on the jumbotron.

Kenny Jacoby is an investigative reporter for USA TODAY covering sexual harassment and violence and Title IX. Contact him by email at kjacoby@usatoday.com or follow him on X @kennyjacoby.