Ex-Casino Boss on Alleged Wynn Abuse: Speak Up and You'd 'Be Gone'

Executives failed to act on complaints, targeted victims: 'WSJ'
By Arden Dier,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 28, 2018 9:55 AM CDT
Ex-Casino Boss on Alleged Wynn Abuse: Speak Up and You'd 'Be Gone'
Steve Wynn is seen at a news conference in Medford, Mass., on March 15, 2016.   (AP Photo/Charles Krupa, File)

Steve Wynn's alleged inappropriate sexual behavior was allowed to continue for decades as casino managers looked the other way—or looked to punish his victims, former employees tell the Wall Street Journal. The CEO and chairman of Wynn Resorts resigned in February after the Journal reported on accusations of sexual misconduct, including from a manicurist who said she was forced to have sex with Wynn. Now, it shares accounts from former employees of Wynn Resorts, who say they were threatened to keep from speaking out about abuse. A former spa attendant at the Mirage says a human resources executive told her to "keep your mouth shut" a day after Wynn allegedly sexually assaulted her in a gym hot tub in the 1990s. Her boss at the time says she felt "sick inside" because "instantly you would be gone if you do anything or say anything."

Another employee says her supervisor didn't believe her when she said Wynn forced her to perform oral sex. An employee of Wynn Las Vegas' salon in the mid-2000s says such complaints were to be directed to Doreen Whennen, the hotel's then-VP, or then-chief operating officer Marc Schorr, whom employees say gave lingerie to female workers and made comments about women's breasts. Neither seemed to take action, while Whennen sometimes said "to look in the employees' files to see if there were any past problems that could be a pretext to get rid of them," the Journal reports. "It was always the person's fault," the salon employee says. "Nobody really looked into it." A lawyer for Wynn—who just sold all of his remaining stake in Wynn Resorts, per Reuters—calls the latest allegations "salacious." Wynn Resorts says an internal investigation is underway. (More Steve Wynn stories.)

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