‘Beneath Deck’ Alum Emile Kotze
Sues NBCUniversal for $850 Million …
Community Denies Sexual Harassment Allegation
Revealed
March 5, 2026
3:00 AM PST
“Beneath Deck” alum Emile Kotze claims producers portrayed him as “immature” and “sexually aggressive,” and now he’s taking them to courtroom over it — however the producers say his go well with ought to be tossed out as a result of they’re protected below the First Modification … TMZ has discovered.
Emile filed a federal lawsuit in New York demanding $850 million in damages from NBCUniversal and the truth present producers.
Emile says he is a South African citizen {and professional} yacht deckhand who was employed to be a star of the present in 2015 for Season 3, on the age of 23.
Emile claims he was advised the present was like a documentary … solely to seek out out it was a salacious actuality TV drama. He claims he was primarily manipulated into embarrassing situations.
He claims producers pressured him right into a pretend romantic storyline together with his castmate Raquel “Rocky” Dakota, inspired heavy ingesting, and orchestrated sexually charged encounters and humiliating pranks.
As well as, Emile claims the producers edited the footage in a “extremely deceptive method to craft a false, defamatory portrayal” of him to make him “immature, incompetent, and sexually aggressive.”
Emile says he was blacklisted from the yachting trade after the present aired. He stated the present brought about him to endure extreme psychological trauma from the betrayal and public humiliation, claiming he was recognized with “PTSD, nervousness, and despair instantly linked to the present expertise.”
The producers scoff on the lawsuit … they are saying a lot of the claims had been introduced previous the statute of limitations, and are “unsupported by any believable factual allegations.” Additionally they argue they’ve a First Modification proper to “form and convey their inventive works” by means of casting and modifying, and so they cannot use the courts to limit their capacity to take action.
