CNN fired producer John Griffin on Monday after the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) arrested him on charges that he trained minors to be "sexually submissive" prior to recent reports that he fantasized about doing sexual acts with his fiancé's young daughter.
Authorities took the 44-year-old senior television producer into custody on Friday after a federal grand jury in Vermont indicted the suspect on "three counts of using a facility of interstate commerce to attempt to entice minors to engage in unlawful sexual activity." The charge was announced by the U.S. Attorney's office in a statement.
Fantasizing About Sexual Acts
The cable network previously announced that it decided to suspend Griffin after he was arrested on Friday. On Monday, CNN fired the senior television producer, calling the charges against the individual "deeply disturbing." The media outlet said that they immediately terminated Griffin's employment when they learned of his arrest, Inside Edition reported.
It was also revealed that Griffin sent graphic texts and videos that have been released by a source showing the former CNN producer's fantasies about his fiancé's daughter. In one text exchange, Griffin allegedly told the source that the young girl was "wearing very closely cut bottoms at the pool." He then used graphic language to describe how he could see the outline of the minor's private body parts.
Other texts that the source showed were considered to be too graphic to quote and were obtained by a woman who allegedly engaged in a sexual relationship with Griffin for a decade. Project Veritas, a far-right activist group, who spoke with the source, tried to reach out to authorities regarding the suspect's crimes.
Additionally, the group tried to reach out to the mother of the children to ensure their safety. Project Veritas also reached out to CNN to inform them of the situation and give them the chance to make a comment, Project Veritas reported.
Criminal Charges
The Vermont Department of Justice was the one that announced Griffin's charges on Friday. The suspect is believed to have used various messaging applications, such as Kik and Google Hangouts, to speak with the parents of minor daughters.
Authorities allege that his overall objective during the conversations was convincing the mothers to allow him to train their young daughters to be "sexually submissive." The former CNN producer conveyed thoughts to the mothers of the victims, including one where he said that a "woman is a woman regardless of her age." He added that he believed women should be sexually subservient and inferior to men, said the Department of Justice.
An indictment in June 2020 cited one incident where Griffin allegedly advised the mother of two young girls, a nine-year-old and a 13-year-old, to make sure that the older sibling was "trained properly." The Department of Justice said that the former producer gave the mother of the kids $3,000 to buy plane tickets so that she and her nine-year-old could leave Nevada and go to Boston's Logan airport.
The daughter and her mother eventually decided to fly out to Boston in July 2020 to where Griffin picked them up with his Tesla. The former producer gave the two a ride to his home in Ludlow, Massachusetts. He allegedly engaged in unlawful sexual activity with the young girl, People reported.
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