The Newsboys’ federal lawsuit is pushing back strongly against past allegations that a woman was raped by a Newsboys lighting technician and it asserts that the report was false and contradicted by police findings at the time.
On Thursday, June 19, 2025, The Roys Report (TRR) released information alleging that in 2014 former DC Talk member and Newsboys frontman Michael Tait drugged a woman and witnessed her rape by a Newsboys lighting technician.
In its report, TRR provided hotel surveillance footage, a police report, and multiple testimonials from witnesses.
RELATED: Michael Tait Accused of Watching Sexual Assault of a Young Woman He Drugged
A woman who chose to be referred to as “Nicole” was a 23-year-old who worked for evangelist Nick Hall’s Pulse Evangelism on Dec. 16, 2014, the night she claims she was raped by Newsboys lighting technician Matt Brewer.
Read the full account here.
The Newsboy’s lawsuit, which was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee earlier this week, argues that articles published by TRR in 2025 and 2026 misrepresented a 2014 incident involving a woman identified as “Nicole.”
According to the lawsuit, the woman told police shortly after the encounter that it was consensual.
“She does, agree, though that any interaction that she would have had with Matt would have been consensual,” the Fargo Police report states, as quoted in the complaint.
The lawsuit claims those statements were known to reporters but were not included in the published articles.
Newsboys’ Lawsuit Disputes ‘Nicole’s’ Claim That She Was Drugged
The complaint also challenges claims that the woman was drugged by Tait, arguing there was no evidence to support that allegation.
Fargo Police found “there is no indication of her being drugged in any way for this to have happened,” according to the report cited in the lawsuit.
The lawsuit further states there was no testing conducted to support claims of drugging and that witnesses did not observe any substances being added to drinks.
“Apart from that glaring inconsistency, had she been given a ‘date rape’ drug, according to medical science, she would not have selectively remembered ‘giving Matt oral sex,’ as the Fargo Police Report states she told them,” the lawsuit argues. “A person incapacitated by such a drug does not have ‘selective recall’ and having ‘selective recall’ is materially inconsistent with the effects of an incapacitating substance as alleged in the Articles. As a practical matter, neither would Nicole have remained in a room if she did suddenly awaken to find herself somehow ‘involuntarily’ or unconsciously giving a stranger fellatio.”
TRR Report Includes Witness Accounts
In 2025, Nicole told TRR, “The next thing that I remember is being on a bathroom floor and feeling like a 1,000 pounds were on me. My body was so heavy I could hardly move. I hear Matt Brewer’s voice, and I remember [Tait] being in there.” She added, “I remember the feeling of my head being pushed down between someone’s legs. I…guess oral sex, or an attempt, but I don’t fully remember.”
TRR’s report also included witnessed testimony from Elizabeth Chan who was playing drums for Moriah Peters (now married to For King & Country’s Joel Smallbone) and who was present during the night of the alleged rape. Chan has since gone on to play drums for artists such as Carrie Underwood, Keith Urban, and Lauren Daigle.
