Ex-Production Assistant Reveals Affair With Matt Lauer

Addie Collins Zinone

An Iraqi war veteran has come forward alleging that she had an affair with Matt Lauer just after she worked on the Today show 17-years-ago.

According to USAToday, 41-year-old Addie Collins Zinone is the first woman to allege misconduct by Lauer on the record. She told her story to Variety, describing how a newly married Lauer seduced her into sexual encounters in his dressing room, a bathroom and his office, equipped with the infamous button under his desk to lock the door.

Variety opined that Zinone's story "illustrates what can happen when a prominent person brings sex into the workplace, and there’s an imbalance of power."

Zinone acknowledged that her affair with Lauer was consensual and that she was an adult at the time, but she says she felt like "prey" and that it had a devastating and lasting effect on her personal and professional life.

She came forward, she said, to "validate" the stories of other women who have accused Lauer, all of them anonymously so far, "because some of our experiences are similar."

Moreover, she charged, NBC executives at the time had to know what he was up to because "there is no way he could have gotten away with it without others above him making these situations go away — manipulating, strategizing, whatever it is they did to wield their power against the powerless.

"He was the golden boy. His contract always got renewed for millions of dollars more, and he was the face of NBC. How is any woman supposed to go up against that?"

Lauer's representative and NBC News declined to comment to USAToday.