Buffalo Bills rookie cornerback Maxwell Hariston has been named as a defendant in a civil lawsuit after a women says she was allegedly sexually assaulted by Hariston when he attended the University of Kentucky in 2021.
Hairston is being accused of sexual assault and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
The lawsuit, which was filed in U.S. District Court of Eastern District of Kentucky alleges the night of March 24, 2021, Hariston came to the women’s dorm uninvited. She says she first met Hairston earlier in 2021 outside their shared on-campus residence hall at the University of Kentucky.
“Plaintiff inquired about the purpose of Defendant’s visit, to which Defendant responded that he wanted to hang out with Plaintiff. Plaintiff declined and further expressed that she was tired and going to bed before turning around and walking away from the door,” according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit states that Hairston followed the woman into her bedroom and ignored her repeated refusals to engage in sexual contact. Hairston then forcibly removed the woman’s pajama shorts and sexually assaulted her, the suit states.
An allegation of sexual assault didn’t keep the Bills from selecting cornerback Maxwell Hairston in round one. That allegation has now taken on a new form.
Hairston was not criminally charged.
The Buffalo Bills were aware of the previous allegations against Hairston even before drafting him in the first-round. Back in April, Bills general manager Brandon Beane said that the team was satisfied through their research into Hairston that nothing happened.
“Yeah, he’s an impeccable kid and we’ve done a lot of research,” Bills G.M. Brandon Beane said after selecting Hairston in April. “I think all teams were aware of the Title IX thing. That was fully investigated by the school. There’s everything out, he even volunteered to do a polygraph and had notes. It was one of those where there was zero — zero — information saying that this actually happened to what the accusation was. Just like anything in this world, you can’t just take someone’s account and think that’s the truth, but yes, we fully investigated that. If there was anything to that he wouldn’t have been invited to the Combine, to the draft — he was at the draft last night. Every person you talk to at Kentucky — teammates, staff there, plus what we’ve done — I would say this is a heck of a young man, every person you ask. That’s unfortunate when things like that are attached to someone’s name and in this case, it doesn’t seem to be anything there.”
