Three brothers sentenced last week on federal sex-trafficking charges engaged in a wider campaign to discredit their accusers than previously known, paying to arrange for favorable coverage ahead of their trial, their publicist confirmed.
The brothers — Oren, Alon and Tal Alexander — were convicted in March and were each sentenced to 30 years. Invoices reviewed by The New York Times show requests to pay two writers $15,000 and $10,000 each. The publicist for the men, Juda Engelmayer, said the writers were paid on behalf of the brothers to write sympathetic posts. One of the writers confirmed that Mr. Engelmayer paid him for his work. The other refused to answer when the Times asked whether he was paid.
In one invoice, Mr. Engelmayer requested that Oren Alexander, via his mother and a family accountant, pay him for social media coverage he had arranged. Another document, directed to a lawyer for the brothers, requested a separate payment. Both documents named the online writers who wrote about the brothers.
“Trying to get journalists and legal commentators interested in examining the entire case, including the defense’s arguments, is a perfectly legitimate part of defending someone in the public arena,” Mr. Engelmayer said in an email.
Those writers’ articles and posts, which were published online and widely circulated, included pieces that sought to dispel the claims of women who accused the men of rape. Mr. Engelmayer confirmed that he paid one writer and that he was aware that the lawyer, Jason Goldman, had paid the other. Mr. Engelmayer has played a central role in coordinating public responses for the brothers since they were arrested in 2024.
One of the writers, Daniel Mael, said he had received “a modest financial contribution” from Mr. Engelmayer, but insisted his work had been independent.
In an email to The Times, Frank Parlato, the other writer, did not respond to questions about whether he was paid. He said he had never spoken directly to the Alexanders. Mr. Goldman, the lawyer, did not dispute that Mr. Parlato had invoiced him, but he said he could not recall if he had paid him directly.
The payments reveal yet another layer in the public relations campaign the brothers executed over the last two years as they fought to bolster their reputations while dozens of women came forward to accuse them of rape. It’s also another example of the widespread, sophisticated and often secretive campaigns that wealthy and powerful people in Hollywood, politics and the tech world have used in recent years to discredit those who challenge them.
Tal Alexander, 40, and Oren Alexander, 39, were two of the country’s highest-earning real estate brokers before an avalanche of assault allegations knocked them, as well as Oren’s twin brother Alon Alexander, 39, a security executive, from their pedestals. All three maintain their innocence and plan to appeal.
The three men were known for their high-flying, hard-partying lifestyles. But rumors that they sexually assaulted women and girls had followed them since high school, and in the summer of 2024, after three women sued them for rape, they mobilized to flip the narrative.
Well before their arrests in December 2024, the Alexanders began a two-pronged defense: one for the courtroom, and one for the public.
They first hired a public relations firm tied to a number of Hollywood smear campaigns, which resulted in the creation of a website that claimed to expose a conspiracy meant to take down the brothers. That site featured photographs of women who had accused the men of rape, as well as photos of people described as crime bosses in an extortion ring. Last year, they employed Mr. Engelmayer, whose clients have included Harvey Weinstein and Sean “Diddy” Combs.
Mr. Parlato, a writer known for exposing the NXIVM cult, requested at least $10,000 to post on behalf of the brothers, an invoice confirmed by both Mr. Engelmayer and Mr. Goldman, the lawyer, shows. In July 2025, he published an article on the Frank Report, his personal digital news platform, suggesting that Kate Whiteman, the first woman to file a lawsuit against the Alexander brothers, fabricated her allegations and was trying to extort them.
The article suggested Ms. Whiteman was a criminal.
In the email to The Times, Mr. Parlato said he believed he had been objective.
“Nobody tells me what to write,” he said. “Nobody sees my stories before publication. I write what I believe is true. Readers can judge for themselves.”
In January 2026, a few weeks before the brothers went on trial, Mr. Engelmayer sent an invoice for $15,000 for his work with Mr. Mael, a podcaster and Substack author.
Mr. Mael flew from Florida to New York to attend the trial, posting frequently on X and his Substack to poke holes in the prosecution’s legal theory and criticize the motives of women on the stand.
Mr. Mael called the payments “a complete and total fabrication,” but when pressed, said he had received funds from Mr. Engelmayer “toward the costs of investigating and reporting on the Alexander allegations.”
“I was never paid or hired by the Alexanders — any suggestion that I was is complete nonsense and baseless,” he said in a text message.
Mr. Engelmayer also confirmed that he had paid Mr. Mael. “We were looking for people willing to do the work of examining a case that much of the public had already made up its mind about,” Mr. Engelmayer said. “In this world, everything is pay to play.”
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