NBC News Accused Of 'Slow Walking' Sexual Assault Story

Sil Lai Abrams

The Hill is reporting MSNBC has been accused by a domestic-violence activist of "slow walking" a "highly sourced" account she provided in a taped interview with network host Joy Reid.

The accuser, Sil Lai Abrams, told Reid that hip-hop mogul Russell Simmons raped her in 1994. Abrams also accused "Extra" host A.J. Calloway of sexual assault for an incident in 2006. "Extra" airs in major markets on NBC owned-and-operated stations.

"I want people to understand how incredibly challenging this is, with a story like mine that’s highly sourced, with me doing this [advocacy] work in the public arena. And I can’t get my story out there?” Abrams told The Hollywood Reporter.

Both men have denied her allegations.

Joy Reid

Abrams, who is a National Association of Black Journalists award-winning writer based in New York, said Reid told her that she believed MSNBC was "slow walking" the story.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Abrams taped an interview with Reid in January at MSNBC's New York studio. The process, which began in December, dragged on for months, the magazine reported. Reid reportedly texted or emailed Abrams, sensing that the network was "slow walking" the story with "stupid" requests

Abrams told the magazine that Reid informed her in April that the network had stopped responding to her questions about when the segment would air.

MSNBC pushed back on that accusation in a statement on Thursday.

“When MSNBC pursues any investigative story our mission is always to be as thorough as we can, to scrutinize sources and corroborate information before we report. Anything else falls short of our journalistic standards," an NBC spokesperson said.

The Comcast-owned network was accused in 2017 of not publishing an investigative piece by reporter Ronan Farrow about Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein's alleged rape and criminal sex acts.