Updated with more info: Mel Tucker responds to the allegations

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So the Mel Tucker phone sex call was consensual per a witness, Brenda Tracy was down to $5 and trying to extort money from Mel Tucker and she was shopping her story to ESPN employees to control how they covered the story. Mel Tucker got railroaded. All from letter today:

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NEWS: Mel Tucker has released a statement following his suspension and sexual harassment allegations:

"Brenda Tracy’s allegations of harassment are completely false."

Tucker also says in the statement that he and Tracy "developed a mutual friendship that grew into an intimate, adult relationship."

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MSU athletic director Alan Haller confirms that football coach Mel Tucker has been suspended without pay.

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Michigan State will wait until Title IX investigation is completed, to make Tucker's move official, sources said. MSU will claim dismissal w/cause to get out of paying Tucker's $70-plus million buyout. School expected to disclose more information in 5 p.m. news conference.

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Mel Tucker fired as Michigan State’s coach, sources told @ActionNetworkHQ. Secondary coach Harlon Bennett will be MSU’s interim coach w/former coach Mark Dantonio expected to assist in an undefined role. MSU investigating allegations Tucker sexually harassed activist/rape survivor Brenda Tracy, USA Today reported. School has called a 5 p.m. news conference

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Michigan State football coach Mel Tucker is the subject of an ongoing university sexual harassment investigation, multiple sources with knowledge of the pending case confirmed to ESPN.

The sources did not confirm the complainant's identity or details about the allegations Saturday night. Sources said the investigation started months ago and remains open.

ESPN filed a public records request with Michigan State on July 30, seeking documents related to any complaints alleging that Tucker violated the university's relationship violence and sexual misconduct policy.

The school's interim president refused the request, citing a passage in state law that exempts information that "would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of an individual's privacy."

"Under FOIA's privacy exemption, information is exempt if (1) it is personal in nature, and (2) disclosure would reveal little to nothing about the inner workings of the government. Information is personal in nature when it is intimate, embarrassing, private, or confidential," Michigan State wrote in its denial.

ESPN believes the denial is a violation of state open records law and has engaged a Michigan-based law firm to pursue potential litigation

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According to her complaint, Tracy sat frozen for several minutes while Tucker made sexual comments about her and masturbated. His violation, she said, reopened 25-year-old wounds from her rape by four men – three college football players and a high school recruit.

“The idea that someone could know me and say they understand my trauma but then re-inflict that trauma on me is so disgusting to me, it’s hard for me to even wrap my mind around it,” she told USA TODAY. “It’s like he sought me out just to betray me.”

In his statements to the Title IX investigator, Tucker acknowledged masturbating on the call but said Tracy grossly mischaracterized the episode. According to him, they had consensual “phone sex.”

“Ms. Tracy’s distortion of our mutually consensual and intimate relationship into allegations of sexual exploitation has really affected me,” Tucker wrote in a March 22 letter to the investigator. “I am not proud of my judgment and I am having difficulty forgiving myself for getting into this situation, but I did not engage in misconduct by any definition.”

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