NEWSMatt Lauer Accuser Brooke Nevils Explains Why She Didn't Call the Police After 2014 Alleged Rape in Russia: 'An Utterly Useless Thought to Have'
Matt Lauer accuser Brooke Nevils revealed why she didn't call the police after the journalist allegedly raped her in Russia while reporting on the Olympics.
Jan. 29 2026, Published 12:24 p.m. ET
Brooke Nevils said there was a dark reason she stayed silent after alleging Matt Lauer raped her overseas in 2014.
“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 her upcoming book, Unspeakable Things, in an excerpt shared by a news outlet on Thursday, January 29.
Matt Lauer's Accuser Said Calling the Police Was a 'Useless Thought' to Have
Brooke Nevils said she couldn't call the cops after Matt Lauer's alleged rape due to being in Russia.
The former NBC employee accused Lauer of raping her in a hotel room during the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia, adding that calling the police was "an utterly useless thought to have."
"If only because I knew that I would never, ever, have let anyone else do that to me and because I was in freaking Russia,” she recounted. “Who would I call? [Russian president Vladimir] Putin? The KGB?”
Brooke Nevils Claimed She Was Abroad With Only NBC Staff
Brooke Nevils was intimidated accusing Matt Lauer of rape, who at the time was Today's longest-serving anchor.
Nevils said she was only abroad with other NBC employees, including Lauer, who was at the height of his popularity as “Today’s longest-serving anchor with the biggest contract in the 60-year history of morning television, worth a reported $25 million a year."
“In the news business back then, his point of view was reality, and if you disagreed with it, you were wrong,” she wrote. "The whole thing had to have been my fault. I had given him the wrong idea, failed to be clear, failed to convince him, failed to stop him, failed to find a graceful way out of the situation without embarrassing him."
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Brooke Nevils Said Being in Russia Was Complicated
Brooke Nevils claimed her personal device was copied in New York before entering Russia.
Nevils said being in a foreign country complicated things, adding, "had [she] been anywhere else, I could have gotten help, or talked to someone, or called my mother, or at minimum done a d--- Google search.”
She claimed that due to surveillance being "legal" in Russia, NBC "made copies" of all their hard drives, including personal ones, before they left New York.
"So that when we returned, they could compare the two to check for malware," she reported. “If I used my phone, my computer, or the internet, NBC would know about it,”
Matt Lauer Insists Interaction Was Consensual
Matt Lauer has inisted the encounter with Brooke Nevils was consensual.
Nevils said the only doctor available was an NBC employee.
"I was surrounded by people whose careers, like mine, were dependent upon Matt’s success,” Nevils claimed.
Lauer — who was still married to ex-wife Annette Roque at the time — has insisted the encounter in Russia was consensual.
