John Legend, Chrissy Teigen’s Team Claim Project Runway’s Michael Costello Posted Fake Cyberbullying DMs
Emma McIntyre/Getty Images, Robin Marchant/Getty Images
Chrissy Teigen’s team and her husband John Legend have challenged cyberbullying allegations made against her by Project Runway star Michael Costello.
A rep for Teigen told Insider that the alleged direct messages she sent Costello in 2014 are fake, while Legend made the same claim in a Friday tweet.
“Chrissy apologized for her public tweets, but after her apology, Mr Costello fabricated a DM exchange between them,” Legend wrote. “This exchange was made up, completely fake, never happened.”
“Honestly I don’t know why anyone would fake DMs to insert themselves in this narrative, but that’s what happened,” he added. “I encourage everyone who breathlessly spread this lie to keep that same energy when they correct the record.”
Honestly I don’t know why anyone would fake DMs to insert themselves in this narrative, but that’s what happened.
— John Legend (@johnlegend) June 18, 2021
I encourage everyone who breathlessly spread this lie to keep that same energy when they correct the record
— John Legend (@johnlegend) June 18, 2021
On Monday, Costello added his name to the list of those accusing Teigen of bullying, posting a statement to Instagram claiming she threatened to destroy his career over a misunderstanding. The post has since been deleted.
“I didn’t want to do this, but I can not be happy until I speak my mind,” he wrote in the post. “I need to heal and in order for me to do that, I must reveal what I’ve been going through. I wanted to kill myself and I still am traumatized, depressed, and have thoughts of suicide.”
Costello said that he had been the victim of a hoax spearheaded by a “former disgruntled employee,” who falsely accused him of saying the “N-word” when referring to a Black designer’s work.
Costello claimed that Teigen sent him private messages over the racism claims, and he posted several which purport to show Teigen saying, “Racist people like you deserve to suffer and die. You might as well be dead. Your career is over, just watch.”
While Costello deleted his Instagram post shortly after Legend and a Teigen representative accused him of forging the DMs, Pop Crave posted screenshots of his original post on Tuesday:
Michael Costello says Chrissy Teigen bullying left him suicidal:
“she told me that my career was over and that all my doors will be shut from there on.” pic.twitter.com/d5r5ycWYJb
— Pop Crave (@PopCrave) June 15, 2021
Insider’s Kat Tenbarge first reported on the allegedly fake DMs, breaking down why they’re so suspicious.
“In the images Costello posted, the verified checkmark is missing from next to Teigen’s name. Verification was introduced to the platform in late 2014 and Teigen was verified by early 2015, which would seemingly suggest the screenshot was taken in 2014,” she wrote.
“But the messages in the images have purple and blue backgrounds — a design change that wasn’t implemented until February 2020, at which point the “@chrissyteigen” account was verified. The background color and the lack of verification appear to be temporally inconsistent.”
Tenbarge also noted that there is a video chat icon in the screenshots, while the feature was not introduced to Instagram until 2018.
“Teigen’s profile picture in the images is the same profile picture she had in 2014, according to archived images of Teigen’s profile,” she added. “But Teigen changed her profile picture no later than December 2016, according to archived pictures of her account. A screenshot taken after that time would have shown her current profile picture.”
