Portland Thorns owner Merritt Paulson steps away from team decisions amid NWSL sexual abuse report

Portland Thorns owner Merritt Paulson has announced that he’ll be stepping away from team operations after a shocking report on NWSL players claiming sexual abuse from coaches and staff around the league was released earlier this week. 

Along with Paulson, team executives Gavin Wilkinson and Mike Golub will also distance themselves from the team after claims of sexual harassment were made against ex-coach Paul Riley, who managed the Thorns through the 2014-15 season, last year.

Findings and indicators from former Acting US Attorney General Sally Yates, who was hired by the US Soccer Federation to oversee an independent investigation regarding the allegations in October of last year, were released on Monday.

The report suggested Paulson knew and tried to cover the allegations of abuse the club had allegedly attempted to hide and that he encouraged other NWSL teams to hire Riley, of whom he once said he had ‘a lot of affection for’ in an email sent to the Western New York Flash front office in 2016.

Portland Thorns and Portland Timbers owner Merritt Paulson has decided to remove himself from decisions related to the front offices of both teams after an independent report regarding allegations of sexual abuse and harassment made from NWSL players last year was released on Monday

‘Yesterday’s Yates report unveiling was the darkest day I have experienced, and I know the same is true for everyone else who loves our team and our league,’ Paulson said in a statement issued on Tuesday, announcing that we would be stepping aside from Thorns and Timbers operations

The independent investigation, headed by former Acting US Attorney General Sally Yates, said Paulson was aware of Paul Riley’s inappropriate behavior while coaching the Thorns for a year from 2014-15  

‘Yesterday’s Yates report unveiling was the darkest day I have experienced, and I know the same is true for everyone else who loves our team and our league,’ a statement from Paulson, issued on Tuesday read. 

‘I would imagine that it was even harder and darker for those whose stories were shared publicly. We have promised the NWSL that we will not do media or make any public statements related to the investigations until the joint NWSL / NWSLPA investigation is released in November, which is tremendously difficult.’

‘I cannot apologize enough for our role in a gross systemic failure to protect player safety and the missteps we made in 2015. I am truly sorry,’ the minority owner of Peregrine Sports LLC, which owns the Thorns and the Portland Timbers, concluded.

Heather Davis – General Counsel of the both the Timbers and Thorns – will now spearhead team operations, as a ring of changes related to the team’s front office were made on Tuesday. 

US Soccer commissioned the investigation by Yates and the law firm King & Spaulding after former NWSL players Sinead Farrelly and Shim came forward with allegations of harassment and sexual coercion dating back a decade involving former coach Paul Riley, who has denied the allegations. 

Their account was first published by The Athletic in September 2021.

Both Shim and Farrelly claim Riley, 58, often took them drinking and used those moments to pressure them into sex, according to The Athletic’s report. In one alleged 2012 incident, Riley, a Liverpool native who was 47 and married at the time, took Farrelly and another player to his hotel room and had sex with both of them.

Riley’s refrain, which Farrelly said she often repeated to herself after having sex with her coach, was that they would be ‘taking this to their graves.’

Among other allegations, Shim told ESPN that Riley invited her to his hotel room one evening.

‘He quickly shut the door behind me,’ Shim said. ‘I saw he was in his underwear.

‘He told me to get on bed and watch film,’ she continued. ‘There was no film pulled up. I knew at that point I had to find a way out and I was not willing to compromise myself for my career or for this person.’

A promo for ESPN’s E:60, which will air on Tuesday evening, does not reveal what happened afterwards.  

Shim says she first complained about Riley in 2015 when she played for him on the Thorns. But while the team declined to re-sign him when his contract expired, he was still hired by the NWSL’s Western New York Flash the following season and by the Courage in 2017.