Eszter Pryor, a former diver with the Ohio State University Diving Club, appeared on NBC News’ Megyn Kelly TODAY show on Tuesday to openly talk about her allegations of sexual abuse by coach William Bohonyi, which occurred in 2014.
Pryor explained to Megyn Kelly,
“When you invest your life into a sport, and your identity is created throughout that and within my own private community, which is a very wealthy community, I was known as Eszter Pryor the diver. And when this happened, my identity was changed because somebody like him had such an effect on me and had such an effect on this community that he changed it.”
Pryor was 17-years-old when she trained under Bohonyi at the Ohio State University Diving Club. While at a diving meet, one of Pryor’s friend’s discovered and reported the abuse by Bohonyi. OSU took action by calling division of child and family services and terminating Bohonyi’s employment, however Pryor and lawyer Robert Allard claim that enough wasn’t done to stop him.
“The only thing they did was quietly terminate him. He kept coaching. He kept having access to minors. There was nothing done to stop him. The only thing they did was protect their own image by getting rid of the bad guy, but as far as releasing a predator to the community, that’s what they’re guilty of.”
When asked by Kelly about the alleged abuse by Bohonyi, Pryor responded saying,
“The way I was raised had a huge impact on this. My mom is a baby boomer, she is kind of an older generation, in which you respect your authorities, you respect men. Most importantly you do not challenge men, even if they are in the wrong. You do not challenge them. And my upbringing, I am not blaming her, but I think the most influential people in my life were men and a lot of this stemmed from trusting somebody and these institutions have a lot of effect on young women.”
The now-21-year-old Pryor has filed a federal class-action lawsuit against Bohonyi, the OSU Diving Club, and USA Diving. When asked why Pryor has also named OSU and USA Diving on the lawsuit, she explained,
“My thing is, they couldn’t do their job, so they put it on me. I was 17 years old and they made it my responsibility to take action for somebody else’s mistake. And it’s taken me years to come to this point but I think that is wrong.”
Allard, who also serves as Ariana Kukor Smith’s lawyer, responded to the questions about the lawsuit, stating,
“In August of 2014, USA Diving, the national governing body for the sport of diving, had evidence. They ahd the photos, they had the videos, they had another victim who came forward to say that she was also sexually abused by this coach. It took them seven months to ban them and all during those entire seven months, he continued to abuse her.”
Pryor is one of many athletes who have recently stepped forward to speak out with allegations of sexual abuse. Kukors Smith filed a civil suit against her former coach Sean Hutchison, along with Mark Schubert, USA Swimming, King Aquatic Club, and Aquatic Management Group, Inc., citing sexual abuse of a minor, negligence, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Ohio State University has also been under investigation for the actions of former team doctor, Dr. Richard H. Strauss, who allegedly engaged in varying forms of sexual misconduct with more than 100 student-athletes between the years of 1979-1997.
Watch Eszter Pryor on NBC’s Megyn Kelly TODAY:
NBC News and the Megyn Kelly TODAY show contributed to this report.
Xoxoxo
“My mom is a baby boomer, she is kind of an older generation, in which you respect your authorities, you respect men. Most importantly you do not challenge men, even if they are in the wrong. You do not challenge them.”
Seriously?
I’m not sure which baby boomers she’s talking about, but certainly not the women I knew in the Seventies (which I would guess was her mom’s generation).
I can’t speak to the rest of her account, but this is a crock.