Mark Geyer has defended his daughter Montanna with a statement about rumours concerning an NRL player. Photos / Facebook
Mark Geyer has defended his daughter Montanna with a statement about rumours concerning an NRL player. Photos / Facebook
NRL legend Mark Geyer has revealed the traumatic circumstances under which he and his family discovered unfounded claims on social media linking his daughter Montanna to a sex tape.
Geyer announced on Tuesday he engaged lawyers to respond to "false and defamatory" claims surrounding his 22-year-old daughter.
The Triple M radio star made a brief statement before his show The Rush Hour went to air on Tuesday night.
"To say that my family is devastated by the actions of persons on social media over the past 24 hours is a total understatement," Geyer said.
"My innocent daughter has had her name, honour and integrity dragged through the mud by these completely false accusations.
"These are lies and defamatory in the highest order."
Mark and Montanna Geyer. Photo / Instagram
It has been alleged that the strongly denied claims first appeared on the NRL Memes Facebook page — which has more than 300,000 followers — where a since deleted post claimed: "The bird in the Tyrone May video is Mark Geyer's daughter. Happy days at Penrith".
The Panthers legend has since told the Daily Telegraph exclusively that he first discovered the claims linking his daughter to an alleged sex tape featuring stood down Panthers star May when he heard Montanna crying upstairs at his family home in Penrith.
"It was my daughter, she had 1000 friend requests on Instagram because they think it's her in the sex tape," Geyer said.
"She came down hysterical. I asked her what's wrong and she showed me."
Geyer described the online trolls allegedly circulating the claims about his daughter as "f***ers".
Panthers supremo Phil Gould on Tuesday took to social media to reach out to Geyer, labelling those that allegedly circulated the rumour "cowards".
@markMGgeyer Your daughter Montanna is one of the sweetest young ladies I’ve ever met. She has the most beautiful soul. The thoughtless and gutless coward who tried to spread this most scurrilous rumour, will be exposed. Rest easy big fella. Give Monny a hug from all at Panthers
Geyer on Tuesday morning said he has been told by his legal advisers at Brydens Lawyers not to provide further comment to claims made on social media about his family.
"I have today engaged Brydens Lawyers to act on behalf of my daughter, Montanna, for the purpose of taking action against those who have published false and defamatory material which has caused incredible distress for my family," Geyer said in a statement released by Triple M.
"On the advice of the solicitors, I do not propose to make any further comment."
The former Panthers forward took aim at an unofficial NRL page on Facebook that appeared to suggest his daughter is the unknown woman in an explicit video allegedly featuring an NRL player.
It comes after it was first reported by Channel 9's senior league journalist Danny Weidler that Geyer and his family have been falsely linked to recent issues that have been reported at the Panthers.
The report claimed Geyer was "angry" and his family was "devastated" by the social media claims, which they say are false.
Breaking : Panthers legend Mark Geyer has engaged lawyers to deal with social media speculation that he says is totally false and defamatory. His family has been wrongly linked to the issues that his old club are dealing with. Geyer is angry and his family devasted. @9NewsSyd
The claims were allegedly made on a widely followed league fan page on Facebook. The posts have since been deleted.
A social media account appearing to belong to Geyer was also seen on Monday night asking for the identity of the administrator of the fan page in the comments of the since deleted post.
"Can someone tell me where/who runs this page, and where they operate of???? NOW!!"," the post read.
The comments reportedly made by Geyer on the Facebook page have also been deleted.
The 51-year-old is one of Penrith's favourite sons after retiring in 2000 and going on to become a popular league commentator and radio personality.
Geyer has regularly spoken about his family during his media career and in 2014 made headlines for an emotional live address about his eldest daughter Montanna.
The former league hard man revealed at the time that he was "rocked" when his then-18-year-old daughter had an epileptic fit.
The father of five broke down on live radio, saying, "I thought I was going to lose her". Montanna was diagnosed with Juvenile Myoclonic Epilepsy.
"On Sunday Montanna had a few friends over," Geyer said, struggling to keep his composure.
"Luckily her friend was in the room with her when it happened. They got to sleep late, probably three or four, as girls do.
"She put her alarm on for seven o'clock in the morning because for her 18th birthday she got a skydive so they were going to go skydiving on Sunday.
