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Pat McAfee and others may be facing some legal trouble after the viral Ole Miss student drama back in February. A viral anonymous message was sent via YikYak about Mary Kate Cornett and her boyfriend's father allegedly having a relationship earlier this year. The rumor began with YikYak, then spread across other larger social media channels, and was even spoken about on McAfee's ESPN show. Now, Cornett is striking back as an attorney for the student has told NBC that there is a possibility of legal action against McAfee and the network.
In her first interview since the national outcry, Cornett sits down with NBC News to tell viewers that this was “an internet rumor that has zero truth to it.”
She pointed out that: “I’m not a public figure that you can go talk about on your show to get more views.”
The 19-year-old added, “I don’t think these boys know what they’re doing to people.”
The cyberattack started as “some sort of fraternity prank” and then exploded into videos and edited screenshots of the rumored situation.
“Having the entire internet, half of the country, hating you and calling you disgusting things, telling you to kill yourself, telling you that you’re a horrible person, that you deserve to die, that’s a really hard thing for a girl to go through,” Cornett said.
The Ole Miss freshman voiced her disappointment in McAfee and how she used to watch his show faithfully.
“I used to look up these people and now these same people are making me feel worthless,” she said.
The rumor has taken a toll on her experience on campus as she had to remove her name from her dorm room door but was still slipped nasty messages under her door. The situation prompted campus housing to step in and grant her temporary housing before moving her to online courses. She felt that her privacy was violated once again when she was writing an entry in class and a student screenshotted it and shared it online.
Despite changing her housing she was still targeted as her phone number was also made public with people randomly messaging her degrading names such as “whore” and “slut.” Some even asked her to commit suicide.
“I (can’t) even walk on campus without people taking pictures of me or screaming my name or saying super vulgar, disgusting things to me,” she said after revealing that she has spent a lot of time in her room instead of leaving the house.
The college student says that her boyfriend and her family have also received hurtful messages during this time. Monica Uddin, Cornett’s attorney, is also potentially seeking legal action against those who helped spread the rumor according to The Athletic.
“I would like people to be held accountable for what they’ve done,” she said. “You’re ruining my life by talking about it on your show for nothing but attention, but here I am staying up until 5 in the morning, every night, throwing up, not eating because I’m so anxious about what’s going to happen for the rest of my life.”
