Neutral Milk Hotel bassist Julian Koster has been granted a protective order against Anna “Nesey” Gallons, the artist who accused him of grooming and sexual assault in 2024.
Gallons was part of the Elephant 6 Collective, alongside Koster, and has performed with bands such as Circulatory System and Music Tapes.
In July 2024, she took to Instagram to allege that Koster had groomed her when she was aged 15, resulting in a sexual relationship just “six weeks before I turned 17”: “This, by all common definitions, constitutes ‘grooming’,” she wrote at the time.
Koster filed for the order less than a year after Gallons made the accusations, and a two-year protection from abuse order was approved last Thursday (February 26) in the district court of Bangor, Maine, where Gallons and her husband live.
According to an order signed by Judge Harris Mattson, Gallons is a “credible threat” to the physical safety of Koster, whom Gallons was found to have abused under state law, as per Bangor Daily News.
In his filing, Koster said he has suffered years of “emotional, verbal, financial and, more recently, physical abuse” from Gallons, adding that she and her spouse had each separately confessed their love for him.
“[They] ultimately demanded that I join a polyamorous relationship with both of them and co-parent their children — or else (i.e., they would destroy me, destroy themselves, etc.),” Koster claimed.
The filing states that he spent three weeks in Maine in May 2024 helping the couple, during which he claims there was “tremendous pressure” to have sex with them.
The filing alleges that the bassist had a panic attack from the couple’s verbal attacks and eventually conceded, allowing Gallons to touch him sexually. “After the assault, I left feeling emotionally brutalized and was terrified to see them again,” Koster claimed, saying he changed his phone number and ceased contact with the Gallons. The grooming accusations were made about a month later, he claims.
In the time between Koster cutting contact and filing his protection order, the document claims that the couple tried to “incite others” against him, and allegedly told him that they have a gun, so they can “defend” themselves against him.
Gallons is now prohibited from possessing weapons and was ordered to immediately relinquish any that she owns to the police. Her and her spouse’s counter-protection orders were denied. She has not commented on the protection order.
At the time of the initial allegations, Koster responded in a post shared to his other band The Orbiting Human Circus’ Instagram, beginning that it was “painful and scary” to share his statement.
“I have been the victim of intimidation, manipulation, and abuse by Nesey Gallons for many years,” Koster wrote. He went on to claim that Gallons and her spouse, Paul, were engaging in “a campaign against me, which is documented in thousands of disturbing, abusive, and obsessive messages”.
He went on to admit they entered a “consensual relationship” when he was 28 and Gallons 16, adding that “though this put her over Georgia’s legal age of consent when our relationship began, it was wrong to allow the relationship to happen at all and I’ve apologized to Nesey many times for that. I should have been more responsible about the age gap, but I deny all the other accusations she’s made.”
Koster also claimed that over the years, he tried to “listen to her and acknowledge the pain that she feels,” but that his efforts were met with “increasingly disturbing behavior on the part of both Nesey and Paul, including thousands of threatening and manipulative messages, which are meant to punish me for not agreeing to what they want.
“In these messages, they’ve demanded that I be in a romantic relationship with them, marry Nesey, move in with them away from my friends and family, finance their living expenses, and let them control me, emotionally, physically, and sexually,” he continued. “They have repeatedly threatened to harm me or themselves if I do not “obey” them.
He concluded his statement by saying he had “lived in fear for years” and was “no longer able to tolerate being abused and controlled”.
“I’m grateful for my friends who know the truth and who continue to love and support me, and I’m now focused on staying safe from my abusers,” he wrote. “These years have been so painful for everyone involved and I pray we can all find a way to find peace.”
For help, advice or more information regarding sexual harassment, assault and rape in the UK, visit the Rape Crisis charity website. In the US, visit RAINN.
