A former Dallas Cowboys executive allegedly spied on cheerleaders as they undressed, ESPN reports

The Dallas Cowboys paid a confidential $2.4 million settlement to four of its cheerleaders in 2016 following allegations that they had been spied upon while undressing by a former team executive, ESPN reports.

Richard Dalrymple, then the Cowboys' senior vice president for public relations and communications, was accused of entering a back door of the cheerleaders' dressing room in September 2015 and "standing behind a partial wall … with his iPhone extended toward them while they were changing their clothes." When one of the women spotted him and cried out, Dalrymple fled, according to a letter sent to the team by the cheerleaders' attorneys.

In a statement issued on Monday, Dalrymple called the accusations "false," saying that "One was accidental" — a reference to the cheerleaders' claim — "and the other simply did not happen." This is a reference to another alleged 2015 incident, when a fan signed an affidavit claiming to have seen Dalrymple taking "upskirt" photos of Charlotte Jones Anderson, a Cowboys senior vice president and the daughter of team owner Jerry Jones. Dalrymple retired on February 2, and, though the team currently supports his claims of innocence, ESPN notes that "no one on behalf of the team acknowledged his years of service, and his retirement was not mentioned on the team's website."

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