Project Runway's Michael Costello Alleges Chrissy Teigen Bullied Him

It looks like Chrissy Teigen's very public fall from grace is going to just keep getting messier and messier.

Taking to Instagram on Monday night, Project Runway alumni and gay designer Michael Costello is opening up and alleging that the 35-year-old model and once-beloved Twitter personality bullied him and tried, for years, to harm his career in the fashion industry.

According to a report from Deadline, Costello was the victim of an online hoax in 2014 that led many people, including Teigen, to believe that racist remarks were being attributed to him. After being publicly dragged online by her, Costello tried reaching out to Teigen privately via direct message to clear the air and let her know that the racist quotes being credited to him were fake. Teigen, however, didn't believe him, telling Costello that his career was "dead" and that people like him "deserve to suffer and die."

Though Deadline points out that Costello has had numerous professional successes and has designed for/dressed superstars like Beyonce, Jennifer Lopez, Celine Dion, and Lady Gaga, his career did suffer a little bit following the fabricated controversy, and Teigen's messages to him even had him contemplating taking his own life.

"So many nights I stayed awake wanting to kill myself. I didn't see the point of living," Costello wrote, sharing his truth on Instagram in a lengthy post that included screenshots of the direct messages with Teigen.

Unfortunately, Costello isn't the only notable LGBTQ+ victim of Teigen's alleged online bullying.

After coming out as nonbinary earlier this year, reality TV star Courtney Stodden also revealed to The Daily Beast that Teigen was one of many celebrities/public figures who was unnecessarily cruel to them back in 2011 when they made headlines for marrying then 51-year-old The Green Mile actor Doug Hutchison in a Las Vegas ceremony. (They were only 16 years old at the time.)

"She wouldn't just publicly tweet about wanting me to take 'a dirt nap' but would privately DM me and tell me to kill myself," Stodden told The Daily Beast about the harassment they received from Teigen. "Things like, 'I can't wait for you to die.' And not only her, but Joy Behar had a field day with calling me a 'slut.' Courtney Love told me I was a 'whore.' People came out of the woodwork to beat up on a kid because she was in a situation that she shouldn't have been in. There were a lot of celebrities acting like playground bullies. Some of the worst treatment I got was from women, and we're not going to get anywhere if we keep holding each other back."

Since Stodden's revelations of cyberbullying originally came out back in May of this year, Teigen has had a very public reckoning with the court of public opinion and has lost out on some of her longstanding brand endorsement deals with the likes of Macy's and Bloomingdale's.

She offered a public apology in May on Twitter (the platform Teigen became famous for when roasting the likes of former president Donald Trump)...

...and after a month-long silence, came back online this week to post a lengthy Medium essay where she continued to apologize for her past online behavior.

"I've apologized publicly to one person, but there are others -- and more than just a few -- who I need to say I'm sorry to," Teigen wrote. "I'm in the process of privately reaching out to the people I insulted. It's like my own version of that show My Name is Earl! I understand that they may not want to speak to me. I don't think I'd like to speak to me. (The real truth in all of this is how much I actually cannot take confrontation.) But if they do, I am here and I will listen to what they have to say, while apologizing through sobs."

She continued:

"There is simply no excuse for my past horrible tweets. My targets didn't deserve them. No one does. Many of them needed empathy, kindness, understanding, and support, not my meanness masquerading as a kind of casual, edgy humor. I was a troll, full stop. And I am so sorry."

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