Chris Cuomo’s CNN producer hosted sleepovers and pool parties friends of his three young children

Chris Cuomo’s CNN producer John Griffin hosted sleepovers and pool parties with friends of his three young children while being investigated for sexually assaulting a nine-year-old girl.

A Connecticut man who knows the Griffin family told of his disbelief that the suspected pedophile was free to interact with children while authorities spent 17 months probing the case.

Griffin, 44, and his wife Allyson, 46, hosted children’s parties at their colossal $4 million mansion overlooking Long Island Sound in Wilson Point, Connecticut.

‘The Griffins have young children, and those young children have friends,’ the resident told Fox News. ‘I know someone who is friends with their daughter and went to a pool party at their house last summer, and he [Griffin] was there.’ 

CNN presenter Chris Cuomo horsing around with producer John Griffin when they worked together at the news network

Griffin and his wife separated last year but had been trying to repair their marriage at some point last summer, sources told the broadcaster. 

The source said it was well known that Griffin was a heavy drinker and was rumored to have spent time in rehab.

He was charged in Vermont in October 2020 for drink driving after smashing into another car.

He was arrested on December 10 in Connecticut on a federal indictment out of Vermont for allegedly soliciting three mothers to have sex with their underage daughters.

However, Griffin had been on the authorities’ radar for more than a year after a mother who took her nine-year-old daughter to meet the TV producer was arrested in August 2020.

Griffin is alleged to have paid the mother $3,350 so that he could sexually abuse the child.

The mother and daughter flew from Nevada to Boston where Griffin picked them up in his Tesla in July 2020. He then took the pair to his $2 million Vermont mountain chalet where the abuse is said to have taken place.  

Police in Henderson, Nevada, arrested 48-year-old Heather Carriker the following month on two counts of child abuse, two counts of sexual assault against a child under 14 and one count of lewdness with a minor under 14. 

Griffin was named in the complaint against her.  

Federal authorities were made aware of the allegations and on September 2, 2020, seized ‘computers, storage media, devices, phones, cameras, MicroSD cards, images and video,’ from Griffin, according to court papers.

But they waited another 16 months before arresting the TV producer, leaving him free to interact with young children who were friends with his own kids.

The Connecticut resident suggested that Griffin’s status in the community may have helped shield him from being arrested sooner.

He told Fox the Griffin family have a ‘nouveau riche vibe’ and ‘splashed money all over town.’ 

Heather Carriker, 48 (left), from Nevada, has been charged with child abuse, sexual assault against a child under 14 and lewdness with a minor under 14 in a case involving fired CNN producer and accused pedophile John Griffin (right) 

Carriker is accused of transporting a nine-year-old girl to Griffin’s ski cabin in Ludlow, Vermont (pictured), for sex in July 2020 in exchange for more than $3,000

Carriker allegedly told police in Nevada that she had the nine-year-old photograph her BDSM sex with Griffin at his Vermont home (pictured) 

A federal grand jury in Vermont last Friday indicted Griffin on three counts of using a facility of interstate commerce to attempt to entice minors to engage in unlawful sexual activity.

According to the indictment, from April to July of 2020, Griffin, who had worked at CNN for nearly eight years, used the messaging apps Kik and Google Hangouts to communicate with people purporting to be parents of young daughters, telling them, among other things, that a ‘woman is a woman regardless of her age,’ that women are ‘the dirtiest sluts possible,’ and that they should be sexually subservient and inferior to men. 

Federal prosecutors stated that Griffin sought to convince parents to allow him to train their daughters to be sexually submissive. 

CNN initially suspended Griffin while awaiting the conclusion of the investigation but the network has since terminated him.

‘The charges against Mr. Griffin are deeply disturbing. We learned of his arrest Friday afternoon and terminated his employment Monday,’ a CNN spokesperson said in a statement.

The federal indictment alleged that Griffin once bragged about how he ‘sexually trained girls as young as 7 years old’ and recommended a mother’s 14-year-old daughter, after describing how she ‘would be a good candidate for such training.’ 

He allegedly offered virtual training, where he ‘planned to instruct the 14-year-old and her mother to remove their clothing and touch each other’ on webcam.

Griffin, 44, a former producer at Cuomo Prime Time (pictured with Chris Cuomo) was fired by CNN after being indicted last week by a federal grand jury for alleged sex crimes with girls 

Federal prosecutors alleged that Griffin (right, with Cuomo) engaged in unlawful sexual activity with the nine-year-old at his ski cabin

He also told them about how in-person sessions would include ‘spanking’ and ‘c**k worship.’ 

According to the indictment, Griffin also ‘attempted to entice two other children over the internet to engage in sexual activity’. 

In another unrelated encounter in June 2020, Griffin ‘proposed to a purported mother of a 16-year-old daughter that she take a ‘little mother-daughter trip’ to Griffin’s Ludlow ski house for sexual training involving the child.’ 

Griffin is the son of longtime William Morris agent Jim Griffin, who represented Regis Philbin, Geraldo Rivera and Fred Thompson. He left the agency in 2009 for Paradigm, before it merged with Endeavor. 

Federal prosecutors say Griffin used messaging apps to convince parents to let him ‘train’ their daughters to be sexually submissive 

However, back in the day, one of Jim Griffin’s clients was a young Chris Cuomo. 

Jim’s son, John, joined Cuomo on CNN’s ‘New Day’ from the show’s birth in 2013 and stuck with the recently-axed anchor until the launch of Cuomo Prime Time in 2018. 

Griffin’s LinkedIn page hasn’t been updated since the producer’s termination by CNN. But, it states that Griffin and Cuomo worked ‘shoulder-to-shoulder’ on each show, ‘producing live breaking news across the country and around the world.’

Cuomo had previously worked with Griffin at ABC News between 2005 and 2013.

Cuomo was fired earlier this month for helping his brother, former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, as the politician faced sexual harassment allegations.  

At a court appearance via Zoom at the U.S. District Court in Connecticut Griffing agreed to be extradited to Vermont.

He also admitted that he had been drinking.

Magistrate Judge Robert Spector asked if he had taken any drugs or alcohol in the last 24 hours.

‘Yes, Your Honor,’ he replied. ‘I am confident it was long enough ago that I am bone-dry sober at this point.’

Griffin is on his way to Vermont to be arraigned on a sex trafficking indictment. 

He faces a mandatory minimum sentence of 10 years in prison and could be handed a maximum sentence of life imprisonment for each count, according to the Department of Justice.