In a shock confession, former Newsboys frontman Michael Tait begged for forgiveness from one of his victims, saying he “inappropriately” touched the younger musician.
Newly released audio from a July phone call discloses Tait telling one of his victims, “All I can say is, from my heart and I’m truly sorry, man.”
The victim, going by the pseudonym Lucas, was a former session and touring musician for Tait. He told The Roys Report that he met Tait at the age of 19 while at a music festival in Birmingham, Alabama in 2000.
“He’s lived off of the souls of other people for long enough,” he said.
The drummer alleged that Tait, who was 15 years older, “groomed, manipulated, and sexually assaulted him sporadically between 2002-2010.”
Reports by Roys and The Guardian cited multiple men alleging Tait groomed and sexually assaulted them from 2004 to 2014.
Tait has not responded publicly to those specific allegations but confessed in a June online post to “touching men in an unwanted sensual way” and abusing alcohol and cocaine for years.
He abruptly left the Newsboys in January of 2025, reportedly telling bandmates and managers that he had been “living a double life” and was leaving “to focus on himself.”
Now, leaked audio from a call between the disgraced singer and Lucas, after nearly 10 years of no contact, details the extent of his lewd behavior.
“There’s no handbook on how to do this, except for the Bible,” Tait confessed on the phone. “[You’re] the first of how many people, but [I’m calling] just to ask forgiveness.”
“I’ve cried, I’ve prayed, I’ve dealt with addictions on every level. I’ve lied, I’ve cheated, I’ve deceived, I’ve destroyed my world around me, set on fire everything around me, and one thing led to another, and the domino effect took over it. But it all started, you know, it all started somewhere.”
During the 45-minute call, Tait did not mention where “it all started” exactly.
However, the extent of the damage is becoming more and more evident as Tait’s victims are saying what took place “destroyed” them in many ways.
During the call, “Lucas” told Tait, “I had no sexual past. I had no debaucherous past. I didn’t even drink…you broke me sexually.”
In separate interviews, Tait’s victims detailed how sexual encounters with the former Christian rock singer broke them too.
“This man destroyed my life,” one of Tait’s victims, Shawn Davis, told the Guardian. He told the outlet Tait pushed him to consume drugs and alcohol and alleges that on one occasion he was drugged and molested by the singer, when he was still a minor.
Two other men, who gave the outlet the names Gabriel and Adam, alleged that they were also drugged and inappropriately touched by the singer.
“This person has stolen a little piece of our souls,” Adam said.
Meanwhile, “Lucas” told TRR the abuse finally stopped after he got married.
“He collects people, and I was a trophy that he collected. What makes you not shiny as a trophy anymore is when you are in a relationship, or especially when you get married. When you get married, he [stonewalls] people,” he said.
Lucas told the outlet that Tait has previously denied being gay, but confessed that, “This sin, this lion, this tiger lived with me, and it got bigger as I got bigger in music, and there was no way out.”
“I’m glad consequences came. I’m glad. I’m glad, dude, as hard as it is on everybody—on the band. We’ve lost everything, dude. The band is done, everything, management’s done, the band’s fleet manager’s done. It’s bad. But that said, it took that to get me to my knees, and it sucks. I hate it with everything in my body. I’ll go to my grave with that. My confession’s like, that’s the worst. It’s horrible, it’s horrible, it’s horrible…I deserve your worst treatment, if you need to. I mean, I deserve everything you want to do to me, because, you know what? I changed your life forever, and not for the better.”
Lucas told TRR that Tait made an overseas call to apologize. However, he decided to record the conversation after realizing the laws where he lived allowed him to do so.
“I don’t want him to be able to make a comeback tour,” said Lucas. “I don’t want him to publish a book. I don’t want him to come out as a solo artist and do his big forgiveness and repentance [tour]. I want his life in the limelight to be over. I want all the joys and luxuries of that [over] too. He’s lived off of the souls of other people for long enough.”
“I’d like to see [Tait] in jail, to be honest,” he told the outlet, “not because I get anything out of it. But I think that’s what’s deserved…I think that’s what’s owed to him.”
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