Recently surfaced bodycam footage captures the awkward incident where Dianna Russini attempts to avoid a traffic ticket by mentioning Kevin O’Connell of the Minnesota Vikings to a police officer.
Contrary to claims she made on a podcast earlier this year, the video does not display any evidence of a FaceTime call between O’Connell and the officer during the exchange.
The video, which runs a little over seven minutes, opens with the officer’s approach to Russini’s vehicle on a snowy day.
Russini explains, ‘I’m an NFL reporter, and I just broke the news of Sean McDermott being fired from the Bills. That’s why I was on my phone—to send a tweet. I planned to pull over because I have to make calls. I know this isn’t your concern, but I wanted you to understand my situation.’
The officer replies, pointing out, ‘You were obviously on your phone for a while… I do understand the demands of your job.’
Then, Russini interrupts and says she was on the phone to former New York Giants head coach Brian Daboll before asking the officer if he’s a fan of the Giants or Jets.
Footage shows Dianna Russini name-dropping Kevin O’Connell to try and get out of a ticket
Russini appears to show a police officer messages with O’Connell but there’s no FaceTime call
That is when the officer tells her he is a Vikings fan, which prompts Russini to show what looks like a text exchange with O’Connell before telling the officer that Minnesota’s quarterback, J.J. McCarthy, ‘sucks’.
After going to his vehicle to check over Russini’s documentation, the officer returns and says to her: ‘I’m gonna cut you a break on the cellphone. I understand your job requires you to be on the phone a lot. Just try to wait ’til you get home, OK?’
The Daily Mail has contacted the Minnesota Vikings for comment.
Back in February, Russini revealed on ‘Stugotz and Company’ that she was pulled over by police weeks before for texting while driving with her two young sons in the car.
She claimed she told the officer she was using her phone because the Buffalo Bills had just fired head coach Sean McDermott and she was trying to report the news.
But, she added, she managed to prevent a ticket by getting the head coach of the police officer’s favorite team to speak with him on FaceTime.
It is another desperately embarrassing episode for the former NFL insider, whose world was turned upside down by her affair scandal with New England Patriots head coach Mike Vrabel.
An investigation into Russini and Vrabel’s alleged relationship was published by the New York Times on June 24.
Russini left her job as an NFL reporter after intimate pictures emerged of her and Mike Vrabel
Not only did it detail how Russini was paid close to $800,000-a-year by the New York Times-owned Athletic before her career collapsed, but it also included comments from her that she wanted to remain private.
However, it also told the story of how bosses at The Athletic were unhappy with her for sharing the story of her allegedly using her relationship with O’Connell to get out of a driving ticket.
‘So he names the team [that he is a fan of] and I go, “Oh, I love that team. Do you want to talk to the coach? You should talk to the coach”,’ Russini claimed on the podcast.
She said she immediately FaceTimed the coach, who ‘played all into it’ and told the officer ‘you should let her go, she’s a good citizen.’
Russini admitted she was ‘desperate’ in the moment because ‘I don’t want to get a ticket. My husband is going to kill me.’
She continued: ‘I’m texting and driving. I shouldn’t be doing that I know that… I [called] a coach to get out of a ticket. Like what a nasty play but it worked.’
Danielle Rhoades Ha, a Times Company spokeswoman, called it ‘unacceptable conduct’, while it later emerged that Russini also never asked or received permission to go on that podcast, which was required.