Lindsay & Rod Ni Powell, Katina’s Daughters: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know

Rod Ni Powell, Katina Powell, Lindsay Powell

Rod Ni Powell and former Cardinals basketball player Russ Smith inside the Louisville basketball dorm in a photo posted in September 2012. (Facebook)

An escort alleges in her new book that she and her daughters, along with other women, were paid to attend stripping and sex parties at the University of Louisville for basketball players and recruits.

Katina Powell says in the book Breaking the Cardinal Rules, that her daughters, Lindsay and Rod Ni Powell, were paid to strip for and have sex with players, recruits and others in the on-campus dorm where the players live between 2010 and 2014.

Five former players and recruits told ESPN’s “Outside the Lines” that they attended the parties. “Outside the Lines” investigators also reviewed documents and other information provided by Powell to verify her claims.

According to a press release promoting the book, Powell based it on five journals she kept with “details of her escort escapades, sexual encounters, murdered relatives and activities at the University of Louisville. ost of the U of L services she provided took place in the men’s dormitory where basketball players reside. Her main contact and the man who paid for her services–the school’s former director of basketball operations and former graduate assistant, Andre McGee–kept Powell and her girls busy from 2010 to 2014. She has hundreds of text exchanges with him to set up her services as well as pictures of her girls with players and recruits.”

Here’s what you need to know:


1. Lindsay & Rod Ni Powell Say They Were Paid for Having Sex With Multiple Players

katina powell, rod ni powell, katina powell daughter, katina powell louisville

Katina Powell, right, with her daughter, Rod Ni Powell, in a photo her daughter posted to Facebook in September 2012 from inside the University of Louisville basketball dorm. (Facebook)

Powell’s daughters, Lindsay Powell, now 24, and Rod Ni Powell, 22, were among the women who allege they were paid to have sex with players, including star guard Russ Smith, who now is in the NBA.

“I believe that McGee came to my mom and said something to her about it, and my mom came to me and I was like ‘OK,’ and we went in another room and we had sex,” Lindsay Powell told ESPN.

Powell’s daughter, Rod Ni Powell, told ESPN that she was paid for sex with Harrell, who is now playing for the Houston Rockets in the NBA.

“Montrezl was there, and I don’t know, I guess he felt left out. He just kind of asked me if I would do it, and I did it. I got paid maybe $100, maybe a little more,” she said.

Russ Smith did not comment when contacted by ESPN. Harrell told the Houston Chronicle, “I don’t know anything about it,” Harrell said. “I didn’t too much stay at the dorm. I stayed off campus. I had a girlfriend off campus. … It was pretty shocking that took place, if it did. I’m right there with Coach [Rick Pitino], as shocked as he is.”


2. The Sisters Were ‘Grown’ When They Attended the Parties, Their Mother Says

There have been allegations made against Powell that she brought her daughters to the alleged parties when they were underage, because she said the parties started when one of her daughters was 15, in 2010.

But Powell told ESPN that her daughters were both “grown,” and of legal age when they were at the parties. Police said they are investigating the allegations to determine if anyone was underage.


3. Rod Ni Powell Told Louisville Fans in a Facebook Post ‘the Truth Hurts’

(Facebook)

(Facebook)

Rod Ni Powell posted on Facebook on Tuesday, the day that she appeared on ESPN along with her sister and mother, firing back at Louisville fans who have criticized them.

“Hahaha the city is mad !! Sit yall non college degree having asses up !! First they say we lying then they say we whores well say what you want feel how you feel but obviously the truth hurts,” Powell wrote.

She also wrote, “Not that I’m getting death threats in my inbox ???????????”


4. Katina Powell Says the Parties ‘Were Fun’ for Her Daughters

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Lindsay Powell, left and her sister, Rod Ni Powell. (Facebook)

Katina Powell talked to WHAS-TV, a Louisville news station about her daughters involvement in the alleged sex parties.

“We do a lot of things together so I am understanding people questioning my parenting skills, but everyone is not perfect or perfect parents. Like I said, it was fun for my kids, they looked at it as fun; they have friends that were doing it. They made friends. It was just fun. It was nothing that I made them do; nothing that I begged them to do, like I said, they begged me,” Powell told the news station.

Like her daughter, Powell said she has received negative attention as the result of the story.

“That I’m a whore. I’m a bad mother. That I drug my kids through the mud. The names they call my kids. I can deal with what people say about me but what they say about my kids that’s what hurts the most,” Powell told WHAS.


5. The NCAA, Louisville & Police Are Investigating the Allegations Made by the Powells

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Former Louisville basketball staffer Andre McGee, left, with former guard Peyton Siva in 2011. (Getty)

The Louisville Courier-Journal reports that university police, along with metro police and the Commonwealth of Kentucky attorney’s office, are investigating whether there was any criminal wrongdoing involving McGee or Powell. Prostitution is a misdemeanor charge that has a one-year statute of limitations, but promoting prostitution is a felony that has no such limit, according to ESPN.

McGee’s attoreny, Scott Cox, told the newspaper, “I am hopeful that any criminal investigation will clear coach McGee because he has not violated any criminal laws.”

Powell told the Indianapolis Business Journal, “How can I be the only one to get in trouble and go to jail, and I wasn’t the only one to play a part in this….I was asked to do this. Why would I be the only one looking at jail time for something I didn’t ask for? That’s not fair.”