Rolling Stone has published new details of the recent leak of private messages and videos of former MEGADETH bassist David Ellefson‘s interactions with a woman who is not his wife.
The magazine obtained a report from the Scottsdale Police Department which shows that Ellefson admitted to police that he had been sexting with a Dutch teenager who had captured video of their encounters without his consent. The police confirmed Ellefson‘s partner’s age as 19. As part of the investigation, Ellefson took a polygraph test and provided a photo of his partner’s driver’s license to prove she was of age. He also shared with the with police screenshots of Snapchat and WhatsApp messages of his interactions with her.
The 56-year-old musician told police that he first met the woman when he was signing autographs at a 2019 concert in Holland. “They struck up a friendship and continued chatting through social media,” the report said. “The second time they met in person was in the Netherlands at a hotel lobby to have coffee and a soda. He believes this was February 2020. He stated there was no physical contact and they just had a conversation. He stated there has never been any sexual physical contact between the two.”
According to Ellefson, his interactions with the woman didn’t turn sexual until “July or August” of 2020, when they each started to masturbate together over Facebook Messenger. “He stated they had about four to five masturbating encounters,” the report said. “The last online sexual encounter was around February 2021. [Ellefson‘s partner] admitted to Mr. Ellefson that she had recorded two to three videos of him masturbating without his consent or knowledge.”
The report added: “[Ellefson‘s partner] admitted that she had shared the video with some friends but wasn’t sure how it got leaked out to others. She was remorseful and agreed to send out a social media statement on her Instagram account that she had been a willing consenting adult during their mutual virtual sexual encounter.
“[Ellefson] stated [the fan] has not extorted him in any way, so he believes he is not the originator(s) of the social media posts making the allegations.”
When Ellefson issued his original statement on May 10, he included a screenshot of a social media post from the woman involved, who denied any suggestions that she was underage at the time. The woman also revealed she recorded the intimate moments and shared them with a friend without Ellefson‘s permission, calling herself “naïve” for doing so and claiming that the contact between her and the musician was “all consensual and all online.” She also called assumptions that she was “groomed” by Ellefson “misinformation”.
On May 24, Dave Mustaine — who formed MEGADETH with Ellefson in 1983 — announced the bassist’s departure from the band, saying, “We do not take this decision lightly. While we do not know every detail of what occurred, with an already strained relationship, what has already been revealed now is enough to make working together impossible moving forward,” Mustaine wrote. Two days later, Ellefson released a follow-up statement in which he vowed to file a “defamation lawsuit” against the person who “illegally posted a very private video” of the bassist and made “false allegations” against him. He also said he was working with the police in Scottsdale, Arizona “in their investigation into charges regarding revenge pornography to be filed against the person who posted the video. This person will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law,” Ellefson wrote. He went on to say that he was “taking this time to be with my family” and wished his “bandmates” the best with their upcoming tour.
MEGADETH has yet to announce a replacement for Ellefson, who was in the band from its inception in 1983 to 2002, and again from 2010 until his latest departure.
David, who became a Lutheran pastor nearly a decade ago, and his wife Julie Ellefson have been married for 27 years. They have two children, Roman Alexander (25) and Athena Grace (22).
