Two more women have alleged that the bestselling author Neil Gaiman sexually assaulted or abused them, extending the timeline of his misconduct across five decades.

According to the new claims – which Gaiman denies – he

• pressured a mother-of-three to have sex with him in return for letting her live with her daughters at his property in upstate New York; and
• made her sign a non-disclosure agreement in return for a $275,000 payment to help her cope with post-traumatic stress and depression following their sexual relationship.

A second woman says he jumped on her “out of the blue” in an “aggressive, unwanted” pass in the 1980s, when they were both in their twenties.

The women came forward after Tortoise published accounts last month of two other women who say they were sexually assaulted by Gaiman while in otherwise consensual relationships with him.

One of these women claims he assaulted her in an outdoor bathtub within hours of meeting her, when she was 22 and he was 61, and went on to have rough and degrading sex with her over the course of three weeks. The other woman, who met him as a teenage fan, says they began having similar sex when she was 20 and that he penetrated her against her wishes when she was 22.

While Gaiman’s account denied any non-consensual sex with the two women, their allegations raised questions about whether he had reasonable belief in consent for sex with them given their vulnerability. Gaiman asked one of them to sign a non-disclosure agreement, the first of two known NDAs he signed with former sexual partners, suggesting weak confidence that his account would survive public scrutiny.

The two new accounts — published today in a new episode of ‘Master: the allegations against Neil Gaiman’ — have been corroborated through documents, emails, and messages seen by Tortoise as well as through interviews with friends and family who the women confided in. Gaiman did not provide any on-the-record response to multiple detailed requests for comment on either set of allegations.

Caroline Wallner lived in a house on Gaiman’s property in Woodstock, New York between 2014 and 2021 with her three young daughters and, until 2017, her husband. Alongside her work as a ceramic artist in a studio in a barn on the property, Wallner and her husband worked for Gaiman and his then wife Amanda Palmer, including doing property maintenance, gardening, and grocery shopping. Gaiman had moved to the area to teach at Bard College.

Around the time Wallner’s marriage ended in 2017, which she said devastated her emotionally, Gaiman told her ex-husband that there was no more work for him on the property, which had provided the family’s main income. Wallner and her daughters were now dependent on Gaiman for work and housing. While she was in this situation, Wallner, then 55, said that Gaiman began pressuring her for sex.

Wallner said: “There were little hints of, ‘we’re going to need the house’. And I remember saying, let’s talk about it. Let’s figure it out. That’s when he would just come to my studio and make me give him a blowjob”. There is no suggestion of physical force, but rather of coercion in light of her housing and family situation. Wallner said: “And he can say it was consensual. But why would I do that? It was because I was scared of losing my place”, characterising Gaiman’s treatment of her as “sexual abuse.”

The UN defines sexual abuse as actual or threatened sexual contact by force or coercive conditions. The UN’s refugee agency, where Gaiman is a goodwill ambassador, has described the allegations against him published by Tortoise as “very serious”, adding that it is “assessing the detailed reporting”.

During Gaiman’s oral sex with Wallner, she said “he used to say to me ‘Call me your master. Tell me you want it. Tell me you want it.’ He would choke me sometimes.” Wallner recalled one incident where she had fallen asleep reading in bed: “When I woke up, Neil was in the bed and he put my hand on his cock.”

Wallner said that whenever she resisted his sexual advances, Gaiman would tell her Palmer wanted the house back where she lived with her three daughters, as well as the studio she worked in. Wallner recalled one occasion when she said Gaiman told her: ‘‘but you take care of me and I’ll take care of you”, understanding it to be a reference to what she called the “sexual trade”.

Gaiman’s position is that his relationship with Wallner was entirely consensual and denies any wrongdoing with her. His account is that their sexual encounters were instigated by her.

Palmer did not respond to multiple requests for comment.

When Gaiman left the Woodstock property during the Covid pandemic, Wallner said she felt “so, so relieved”. But then Gaiman began sending her sexually explicit photos and videos of himself, asking her to send him ones of herself. After Wallner stopped answering Gaiman’s sexual video calls, in June 2021, she said his business manager told her to vacate the property by December that year.

Gaiman’s position is that this request was always a possibility, as Wallner had been living there with her family rent-free for the preceding six years. This position does not acknowledge Wallner and her ex-husband’s work for Gaiman and Palmer while she lived on the property.

Gaiman’s business manager initially offered Wallner $5,000 as compensation for leaving the property, requesting that she sign a confidentiality agreement. The area saw the highest house price growth of any US metropolitan region during the pandemic, so Wallner asked for more time to find affordable housing for her and her daughters.

Wallner said she was treated for depression and post-traumatic stress during this period with the financial support of a friend. After finishing her stay at a therapy centre, Wallner emailed Gaiman’s representatives on 9 December 2021, saying she had tried “to come up with an amount that I feel justifies signing a release that in essence takes away my agency to speak freely about what I went through. 300K is what I came up with. 150 for the real estate issues and 150 for the sexual ‘trade’ issue – something that I am trying to come to terms with. Therapy alone is costing a fortune.”

Gaiman settled with Wallner for $275,000 and a non-disclosure agreement less than two weeks later. The NDA “disputes and denies that Wallner has sustained any losses, damages, or injuries for which Gaiman is legally responsible.” Gaiman’s position is that he settled with her to avoid expensive and protracted litigation.

The NDA prohibits Wallner from talking about Gaiman with “family members, friends, associates” and from filing, reporting, or prosecuting any action or proceeding in “any court, governmental agency, or before any tribunal whatsoever or wheresoever”. If Wallner is asked to make disclosures by a “valid legal process”, the NDA says she must give Gaiman 20 days notice and help him resist disclosure.

New York courts have voided NDAs that sought to frustrate official investigations and, across the US, NDAs are void when they attempt to limit reporting of criminal allegations by an alleged witness or alleged victim.

Gaiman’s position is that his NDA with Wallner makes no reference to law enforcement and that there is nothing to report anyhow. His position is that the NDA used language that was deemed appropriate to both parties’ experienced lawyers.

Andrew Brettler, who has acted for Russell Brand, Danny Masterson, and Prince Andrew, represented Gaiman. Wallner said she is looking for new legal representation.

She said she wanted to speak out against feelings of “fear and shame – those feelings don’t belong to me”. She said she wanted to tell her story to support the first two women who came forward, adding “the fact they were the same age as my daughters now was painful to hear.” Wallner said that the trait she shared with the two women wasn’t age, but vulnerability. “Saying ‘yes’ to an exchange with a powerful, wealthy man when you are vulnerable and fearful is never simple or clear,” she said. “Even if it’s seemingly consensual.”

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Julia Hobsbawm OBE was a 22-year-old book publicist when in 1986 she was with Gaiman, then 25, at her studio flat in Chalk Farm, London. Hobsbawm said: “I literally have no memory of how he came to be back there. What I’m totally certain about is that romance was not on the cards, not for me. And I did not believe it was on the cards for him.”

In what Hobsbawm said was “an aggressive, unwanted pass”, Gaiman “jumped” on her “out of the blue”, forced his tongue into her mouth, and pushed her onto her sofa, before she wriggled free. Hobsbawm said she then cut off contact with Gaiman. She says she now wished she had called Gaiman out back then as she is plagued by the incident to this day and worries that she enabled his alleged misconduct to continue.

Gaiman’s account is that when he realised Hobsbawm wasn’t receptive to his attempt to kiss her, he stopped. His position is that it was no more than a young man misreading a situation, adding that its inclusion alongside criminal allegations – from Tortoise’s earlier reporting – would mischaracterise it.

While Hobsbawm’s allegation might appear less serious than other allegations against Gaiman, English criminal law defines sexual assault as one person intentionally and sexually touching another without their consent, and that there is no reasonable belief by the alleged perpetrator in the other person’s consent. It does not necessarily involve violence, but it can cause severe emotional distress, which is why authorities treat it seriously – and why Hobsbawm said she remembers the incident.

Since the release of the four-part podcast “Master: the allegations against Neil Gaiman”, the author has not made a public statement either directly or through his representatives. Hobsbawm and Wallner’s accounts are featured in a new episode published today. All episodes are free to listen to.

The first woman to come forward, Scarlett – who asked for her surname to be withheld to protect her identity – alleges that Gaiman, then 61, sexually assaulted her when she was 22 years old within hours of their first meeting in February 2022, in an outdoor bath at his New Zealand residence where she worked as a nanny to his child. Gaiman’s account is that they only cuddled and made out in the bath and that he had established consent for this.

Gaiman’s sexual relationship with Scarlett started a month and a half after he settled Wallner’s sexual abuse allegations, which his account denied. His sexual relationship with Scarlett lasted three weeks during which, she alleged, he subjected her to rough and degrading sex. Gaiman’s account claimed they only engaged in consensual digital penetration.

In May 2022, months after her work in his household had ended, Gaiman asked Scarlett to sign an NDA that was backdated to the outdoor bath episode. In October 2022, Scarlett reported Gaiman to New Zealand Police, who said their “attempts to speak to key people as part of this investigation and those efforts remain ongoing”. Gaiman’s position is that there is a lack of substance in her criminal complaint.

The second woman to come forward – we used her initial K at her request – met Gaiman as an 18-year-old fan in Florida in 2003 and began a sexual relationship with him two years later when he was in his mid-forties.

K alleges on a trip to the UK in April 2007 Gaiman penetrated her vagina with his penis despite her asking him not to as she was suffering from a painful infection. Their relationship ended the following year. Gaiman’s account denied any unlawful behaviour or non-consensual sex with K.