Adam Schefter and ESPN are in the crosshairs over how Schefter’s Tuesday report that Dalvin Cook and his ex-girlfriend, Sgt. 1st Class Gracelyn Trimble, are accusing each other of domestic violence.
Adam Schefter’s first tweet about the news was to relay Cook’s allegations, via his agent, that he had been a victim of domestic violence and extortion. About 2.5 hours after his initial report, Schefter shared an ESPN story that detailed Trimble’s allegations.
Trimble’s attorney, Daniel Cragg, ripped ESPN for this sequence of reporting.
“ESPN’s journalistic malpractice yesterday sends a painfully clear message to billions of girls and women around the world that they should be afraid to come forward because media companies like ESPN are more interested in protecting the powerful celebrities that make them money, rather than engaging in honest reporting and competent journalism,” Cragg said in a statement to USA Today.
ESPN told The Post it was addressing the matter with Schefter, who apologized for his methodology on Wednesday’s “Sportscenter.”
“In a case like this, it’s important to reach out to all sides for information and comment,” he said. “When I got the information the other night, I didn’t do that. I could have done a better job reaching out to the other people, especially on a story as sensitive and as significant as this. Didn’t do that properly and it’s a reminder to slow down in this world.”
Cook is being sued by Trimble, who accused the Vikings running back of “giving me a concussion, leaving a scar on my face and taking me through hell” in a lawsuit filed Tuesday, per the Star-Tribune of Minneapolis.
The Star-Tribune, in reporting on Trimble’s lawsuit against Cook, shared disturbing messages between Cook and his ex-girlfriend, in which she sent him a photo of herself with cuts and bruises on her face that she said Cook had caused. He apologized, saying the situation had gotten out of hand.
