Longtime TV host Charlie Rose has been accused of misconduct toward women. His alleged actions involved walking around naked when the women were summoned to his apartment for work, lewd phone calls and unwanted touching.
The incidents, which took place from the 1990s to 2011, were recounted by The Washington Post, which quoted a mix of named and unnamed sources. Eight separate women made allegations against Rose.
The 75-year-old, who has a show on PBS and is also a “60 Minutes” correspondent, was suspended by both CBS and PBS after The Post report was published.
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Rose issued a statement to The Post that was included in the report.
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“In my 45 years in journalism, I have prided myself on being an advocate for the careers of the women with whom I have worked,” Rose said in the statement. “Nevertheless, in the past few days, claims have been made about my behavior toward some former female colleagues.
“It is essential that these women know I hear them and that I deeply apologize for my inappropriate behavior. I am greatly embarrassed. I have behaved insensitively at times, and I accept responsibility for that, though I do not believe that all of these allegations are accurate. I always felt that I was pursuing shared feelings, even though I now realize I was mistaken.”
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“I have learned a great deal as a result of these events, and I hope others will too. All of us, including me, are coming to a newer and deeper recognition of the pain caused by conduct in the past, and have come to a profound new respect for women and their lives,” he added.
His accusers did not seem in a mood to forgive.
“It has taken 10 years and a fierce moment of cultural reckoning for me to understand these moments for what they were,” said Reah Bravo, first an intern and then an associate producer for Rose’s PBS show starting in 2007. She claimed harassment in various forms.
“He was a sexual predator, and I was his victim,” she said.
In an anecdote The Post attributed to sources it did not name, the paper said young women would be required to work at Rose’s apartment. The host would reportedly then go into the bathroom and turn on the shower. In one case, a woman ignored Rose’s efforts to call her, but said Rose then stood behind her in a towel.
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The Post noted what happened when she reported the incident.
“A few days later, she said, a male colleague approached her, laughing, ‘Oh, you got the shower trick,'” The Post reported.
Former assistant Kyle Godfrey-Ryan said when she was 21, Rose would call her in the late hours to tell her he was fantasizing about her swimming naked in his pool.
“It feels branded into me, the details of it,” Godfrey-Ryan said.
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She told Yvette Vega, Rose’s longtime executive producer, about her experience.
“I explained how he inappropriately spoke to me during those times,” Godfrey-Ryan said. “She would just shrug and just say, ‘That’s just Charlie being Charlie.’”
In a statement, Vega said she should have done more to protect young women like Godfrey-Ryan.
“I should have stood up for them,” said Vega, 52, who has worked with Rose since his PBS show began airing in 1991. “I failed. It is crushing. I deeply regret not helping them.”
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