Female employee’s: Panthers Owner Jerry Richardson “asked them if he personally could shave their legs.”
Source – Allegations have surfaced against Panthers owner Jerry Richardson and the environment he has run in Carolina, containing both subtle and overt charges of sexual harassment and misconduct that at once feel stunning and familiar.
Richardson, the 81-year-old principal owner of the Panthers since their inception in 1995, has reached at least four “significant” monetary settlements with former employees due to his behavior, racially slurred a black Panthers scout and used his power and status to lord over a disturbing environment, according to a wide-reaching investigation by Sports Illustrated.
The Panthers on Friday said they had opened an investigation into Richardson’s behavior, hiring outside law firm Quinn Emanuel Urquhart and Sullivan LLP and saying the team takes the then-publicly unknown allegations seriously. On Sunday, the NFL announced it was taking over the investigation of Richardson, who, according to SI, did everything from ogling women on “Jeans Day” to inappropriately touching them under the guise of putting on their seat belts.
Friday was “Jeans Day,” and the billionaire would ask Panthers employees to turn around so he could see their figures, each time offering up a compliment — ‘”I bet you had to lay down on your bed to fit into those jeans,” was one recycled phrase.
Employees mostly excused this as action by a man from another generation, a Southern man whom everyone simply referred to as “Mister” around Carolina headquarters.
“No one ever said anything, at least not that I heard,” one former Panthers employee told SI. “He was the boss. It was [viewed] more of a creepy-old-man thing than a threat.”
According to the report, Richardson would try to gain trust of women he employed before further harassing them. He would send hand-written notes to women, sometimes containing cash with which he would say to buy dresses or a massage. He would then cross a line, they said, when he studied their bodies.
He would pay for manicures when he did not approve of their nails, they said; multiple female employees told SI that Richardson asked them if he personally could shave their legs.
In further allegations that echo the ones Harvey Weinstein is facing, former employees said he would request their presence at a Bank of America Stadium suite. They would be guided to the suite by a Richardson assistant, who would then leave. One female former Panthers worker said when she arrived, Richardson was barefoot and requested a foot massage. Others had stories about Richardson giving back rubs that traveled too far down their spine.
“The first time, you thought it was an important meeting with the owner,” one former employee said. “You [then] realized it was never anything that couldn’t be discussed over the phone.”
Richardson, a North Carolina native, would use Southern gentleman etiquette for further inappropriate behavior, the report said. In what became known as the “seat belt maneuver,” he would open the car door for a female employee then insist on buckling her seat belt. In the process, he would brush his hand across their breasts, accusers said.
“You look back, and it’s wackadoo,” one former Carolina employee said. “You felt preyed upon. You felt fear. You felt self-doubt. But when you’re in [that environment], everywhere you go, every family gathering, it’s, ‘Oh, you work in the NFL? That’s so cool.’ And you don’t want to lose your job.”
UUUMMMMM so that’s new. Shaving someone’s legs is a turn on? Is it an old person thing? Is it a hair fetish and who the fuck still has leg hair. Did Richardson only hire chicks with hairy legs and did he have a Ric Flair “No Hair, No Flair” policy? “No Hair, No Jer?”
To be fair if you own an NFL team and you have a statue of yourself outside your stadium along with Billions of dollars, it’s probably in your wheelhouse to bring girls around, and it’s even more likely you’ll ask them to do some weird shit. That’s what rich people do. They have everything so they do other shit to see how far they can move the line. That’s all the excitement left I guess when your 81.
“Gee I’ve never shaved a woman’s leg before. Maybe I’ll ask the chick from accounting tonight!”
It’s the same reason Prince wanted someone to fetch him a purple giraffe at 3 is in Minnesota. When no one ever says no, you think you can have anything you want anytime.
Dean Blundell
Dean Blundell is a Canadian radio personality. Best known as a longtime morning host on CFNY-FM (The Edge) in Toronto, Ontario. In 2015 he was named the new morning host on sports radio station CJCL (Sportsnet 590 The Fan). Dean started his career in radio in 2001 and for nearly 20 years been entertaining the radio audience. Dean’s newest venture is the launch of his site and podcast which is gaining tremendous momentum across North America.