The New York Rangers striker Artemi Panarin and Madison Square Garden Sports, the company who owns the team, paid financial colonies to an employee of the Rangers last year after alleging that Panarin had sexually assaulted him, according to an NHL source who examined the colonies and three other informed people about them.
This woman left the organization in August 2024 by concluding the agreements, which included the unsaid and no admission of distribution clauses. A settlement agreement was concluded with Panarin and another was with MSG Sports. Several people of the organization were aware of the agreements and circumstances surrounding his departure, and some of these people spoke to Athletics Provided that their identity is not disclosed because they are still working in hockey.
The alleged assault took place in December 2023 during a trip to the Rangers road, according to two sources of the rangers informed of allegation. Panarin and the woman, who were regularly part of the team’s travel party, were during an post-match rally in a hotel with a dozen other players and staff. Panarin would have taken his phone and would have said that he would only give him back if she recovered her from his hotel room, the sources said. When she went to her hotel room to recover her device, Panarin pinned her on the bed. She pushed him away, recovered his phone and left the room.
Neither Panarin nor his agent responded to a request requesting comments. An MSG Sports spokesperson said in a statement sent by email: “The case was resolved.” The woman – Athletics Generally does not identify the alleged victims of sexual misconduct without their consent – only said: “The case was resolved.”
The NHL wrote in an email: “The club has kept an external law firm to conduct an independent investigation, the league of which was fully informed. We consider the question closed. “
There is no file that the woman reports the incident to the police. Nor did she immediately alert the team. But about three months after the alleged sexual assault, she informed the team as part of a separate incident. The team learned that the woman, whose anxiety around plane trips, was well known among the team members, had shared her anti-animated drug with a player who had the same problem. She was put on paid leave while waiting for the outcome of this investigation.
The employee woman said she was treated unfairly, according to team sources, and she then informed the alleged assault team.
While the woman was still on leave, an MSG Sports executive summoned a virtual meeting which included several staff members of the Rangers office and a human resources representative. Participants were told not to talk to the people about the woman’s situation, according to several people on the call. The lawyer “completely raised us”, according to a participant, because people were speaking openly about the absence of the woman.
A person who worked for the rangers when the woman was placed on leave said that the suddenness of the woman’s exit made it a subject of conversation within the organization: “It is not at all secret every time someone disappears.”
In August, MSG and Panarin concluded settlement agreements with the woman, and his job with the team ended.
At the time of the disclosure of the woman, Panarin led the team with 43 goals and 102 points and was in the running for the Hart trophy, awarded the most useful player of the NHL to his team. Korkino, 33, from Korkino, in Russia, led the team to mark each year since he joined the club as a free agent in 2019.
The League and the Rangers refused to say if Panarin was subject to a discipline.
In February 2021, Panarin took a leave of the team for personal reasons following complaints printed in a Russian newspaper that he was involved in a physical altercation with a woman in Latvia in 2021. The Rangers denied allegations, calling them a “intimidation tactic” used against him in response to his comments on Russian policy.
On Wednesday, the Rangers announced that Panarin had been appointed team MVP for the 2024-25 season.
(Photo: Elsa / Getty Images)
