A lawsuit filed by Scarlett Pavlovich against the musician Amanda Palmer and writer Neil Gaiman in the US has accused the famous artists of human trafficking. The complaint accuses Palmer of “procuring and presenting” Pavlovich to be sexually abused by Gaiman.
Pavlovich alleges that, when she was 22, Palmer befriended her while she was homeless, promised her a live-in childcare job and withheld pay, while Gaiman allegedly sexually assaulted their young and vulnerable employee.
Allegations of sexual assault made against Gaiman, 64, by eight women have been building since 2024, when Tortoise Media released an investigative podcast series hosted by Standard columnist Rachel Johnson. This was followed by investigation published in Vulture magazine. Gaiman has denied the allegations.
Pavlovich has filed the charges under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, a set of American laws designed to combat criminal activity worldwide as well as domestically. The alleged events took place in New Zealand, but the lawsuit has been filed in Wisconsin where Gaiman currently lives, as well as New York and Massachusetts, the states where Palmer, an American citizen, is thought to be living at the moment.
Who is Amanda Palmer?
Palmer, 48, is an American musician, singer and performance artist. She was one half of the musical duo the Dresden Dolls, a self-styled “punk cabaret”, and lead singer of her band, Amanda Palmer and the Grand Theft Orchestra.
She gained a reputation as a beloved feminist musician for speaking about her abortions during tours, but drew the ire of disability activists for her portrayal of one half a pair of fictional conjoined twins in her other band, Evelyn Evelyn. Another controversy involved her self-publication of a poem she wrote about the Boston Marathon bomber.
In 2012 she became the first musician to raise over one million dollars via crowdfunding website Kickstarter, and advertised for fans to play for her for free (or “for hugs”) during live performances.
Palmer married Gaiman, a successful fantasy author with a net worth estimated to be £14.5 million, in 2011. Their son was born in 2015.
Blogging about her open marriage with Gaiman in 2019, Palmer wrote: "We’re just slutty, but compassionately so." The musician began posting about marital issues in 2020, when Gaiman controversially relocated from New Zealand to Scotland in contravention of the latter country’s coronavirus lockdown rules. The British author claimed he did so because he and Palmer "needed to give each other some space".
The couple announced their intention to divorce in 2022. Palmer has said that their divorce and custody proceedings are “ongoing” as of January 2025.
The allegations
According to the lawsuit, Palmer befriended Pavlovich in 2020, during the Covid pandemic. At the time, Pavlovich was homeless and sleeping on the beach, something she alleges the older woman knew about.
Pavlovich alleges that Gaiman raped her the first night that she agreed to babysit for the couple, in February of 2022. She claims that, after assaulting her in an outdoor bathtub, “Gaiman said words to the effect of ‘Amanda told me I couldn’t have you’.”
The lawsuit claims that Palmer was both aware of Pavlovich’s vulnerable state and “told Gaiman about this” because Palmer “knew about Gaiman’s history of sexual misconduct” and “knew about Gaiman’s need to humiliate and degrade his female sexual partners because, as he put it, it was the only way he could ‘get off’.
“Palmer, in other words, either knew or should have known that she was marking Scarlett as prey in Gaiman’s eyes.”
The lawsuit alleges that Palmer then offered Pavlovich a job as a live-in nanny for herself and Gaiman, who offered to use his industry prestige to help their new nanny in her writing career.
Pavlovich, according to the lawsuit, became “an economic hostage to Palmer and Gaiman” as they withheld pay. During this period, Gaiman allegedly repeatedly raped their nanny, including incidents where he anally raped her with butter or truffle oil, choked and whipped her with a belt, and orally raped her so hard she was sick before ordering her lick it up.
On one occasion, Pavlovich alleges, Gaiman penetrated her on a hotel room bed next to his son “while still talking to his child”, despite her whispered protests.
“Scarlett endured those acts because she would lose her job, housing, and promised future career support if she did not,” reads the lawsuit.
Palmer and Gaiman did not “forget to pay Scarlett”, according to the charges, but “intentionally withheld Scarlett’s pay” in order to “have Scarlett trapped, vulnerable, and penniless”.
Did Palmer know?
Per the lawsuit, Palmer had “expressed disgust for what Gaiman had done”, called him “Weinstein” after the famous sexual predator, predicted ”he would be inevitably ‘MeTooed,” in reference to the social movement encouraging people to speak out against sexual violence.
Pavlovich has alleged that she told Palmer about Gaiman’s abuse after he left for Europe with their son. Palmer “expressed no surprise”, per the lawsuit, and told her nanny “I bet he did”.
Palmer allegedly relayed to Pavlovich that “more than a dozen women, including several former employees, had previously come to Palmer about abusive sexual encounters with Gaiman” and “some of those women had reported disturbing experiences”.
Pavlovich alleges that Palmer then placed her nanny in temporary accommodation in case “they decided to ship Scarlett to the UK to be with Gaiman and the child”.
When Pavlovich was receiving psychiatric care for suicidal ideation, Palmer allegedly had her friends pack up Pavlovich’s possessions and cancelled her accommodation, rendering her homeless. Pavlovich alleges that she was never paid for the work she provided as a nanny.
When Pavlovich filed a police report against Gaiman, Palmer “refused to talk” to the authorities.
Palmer has not commented on the lawsuit.
In January, a spokesperson for Palmer said she was “profoundly disturbed” by the allegations published in Vulture but declined to pass comment, given the state of her custody arrangement with her son.
In the lawsuit filed by Pavlovich, she stated her reason for filing is to be compensated for the harm done to her and so it “never happen[s] again” to another person.
