WEBVTT - Did Amy Griffin invent a story that could change how real victims are believed? 0:00:00.320 --> 0:00:04.479 Welcome to Hot Mike's. Thanks for tuning in on Facebook, YouTube, 0:00:04.519 --> 0:00:07.160 tune in wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Billy Bush. 0:00:07.160 --> 0:00:10.600 Thank you very much, because today's a big episode. I 0:00:10.640 --> 0:00:14.920 have found the real Claudia in the Amy Griffin saga. 0:00:14.960 --> 0:00:18.640 Here we have connected. She is none too happy about 0:00:18.640 --> 0:00:22.759 being involved in this whole thing. It came from Hot 0:00:22.800 --> 0:00:27.160 Mike's loyal viewer named em. We'll call her EM. She said, Billy, 0:00:27.160 --> 0:00:30.240 I'm loving your podcast, especially your series on Amy Griffin. 0:00:30.480 --> 0:00:34.159 By the way, I know who the real Claudia is. Wow, 0:00:34.720 --> 0:00:38.640 she does know who the real Claudia is. It checked out. 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:42.360 I made contact what led me to the real Claudia. 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:45.000 I'll give you the play by play a little later on, 0:00:45.120 --> 0:00:48.960 but it's all becoming so real here. I have seen 0:00:49.200 --> 0:00:55.360 mister Mason, the teacher that Amy alleges graped her for 0:00:55.400 --> 0:01:00.000 four years in middle school. The coach who was friends 0:01:00.360 --> 0:01:03.680 with that teacher and with whom Amy connected years later 0:01:03.760 --> 0:01:10.720 and confided in today. Also the Lost Martha Stewart podcast, 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:13.679 the episode with Amy that I think was all but 0:01:13.760 --> 0:01:18.240 scrubbed from the internet, like Amy's comment on Reese Witherspoon's 0:01:18.319 --> 0:01:23.679 Instagram page and Sam Lansky, the ghostwriter. Did he just 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:28.440 blow Amy's cover? But let's take a look at Amy's 0:01:28.600 --> 0:01:31.800 side here, right. We've talked a lot about the California 0:01:31.840 --> 0:01:35.839 case against Amy Griffin filed by Joline Altam, which started 0:01:35.880 --> 0:01:39.959 all of this on March fourth, twenty twenty six, where 0:01:40.040 --> 0:01:45.880 Jolene cited intentional infliction of emotional distress, negligent infliction of 0:01:45.920 --> 0:01:51.400 emotional distress, invasion of privacy. In essence, Jolene accuses Amy 0:01:51.600 --> 0:01:55.360 of a hostile takeover of her most dramatic childhood memories. 0:01:56.440 --> 0:02:00.960 We have discussed all the things that are going against 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:06.640 Amy through her book Proposals. She identified the teacher who 0:02:06.720 --> 0:02:12.680 perpetrated such alleged violent acts of pedophilia against her, yet 0:02:12.800 --> 0:02:17.640 he remains in town in Amarillo. She identified a family 0:02:17.720 --> 0:02:23.200 friend who she says abused her when she was very, 0:02:23.720 --> 0:02:29.880 very young eight years old. Amy conducted a failed hometown 0:02:30.120 --> 0:02:34.200 investigation using one of the top corporate investigative firms in 0:02:34.240 --> 0:02:38.680 the world. No corroborators were found, other than another girl 0:02:38.720 --> 0:02:42.160 from the school named Ali, who said, oh, I remember 0:02:42.200 --> 0:02:44.320 that teacher. He looked at you in a creepy way, 0:02:45.880 --> 0:02:49.200 and then you know, there's James If you read the 0:02:49.240 --> 0:02:53.000 tell you know, James, he's the kid in college when 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:58.440 they were studying overseas in Europe who graped her. I 0:02:58.480 --> 0:03:01.200 guess after her sophomore year something, so you know, maybe 0:03:01.240 --> 0:03:04.680 around twenty or twenty one. That was only four years 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:09.760 after the final alleged grape by her middle school teacher. 0:03:10.600 --> 0:03:13.239 And of that, you know, four years or so later, 0:03:13.480 --> 0:03:17.680 there's no memory, didn't trigger any memories. In the book, 0:03:19.000 --> 0:03:25.160 MDMA induced the recovery of Amy's memories, but in the 0:03:25.200 --> 0:03:29.679 Nevada suit, the memories came back before the medicine even hit. 0:03:30.760 --> 0:03:34.280 A major premise of the book was that this was 0:03:34.320 --> 0:03:41.720 all about recovering traumatic childhood memories using the drug MDMA. 0:03:42.400 --> 0:03:47.920 Do the details of the grape align with another student's experience? 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:53.640 And who is Claudia she's written about in the book? 0:03:53.840 --> 0:03:57.520 Amy cited the elusive Claudia, the character in her book 0:03:57.520 --> 0:04:01.800 whom she says haunted her girl from her eighth grade class, 0:04:01.880 --> 0:04:06.000 whom she thought shared the abuse she remembers. She writes 0:04:06.040 --> 0:04:10.560 about seeing the teacher, this alleged pedophile teacher, you know, 0:04:10.960 --> 0:04:14.200 putting his hand on Claudia's shoulder in the hallway, and 0:04:14.240 --> 0:04:16.800 she thought, oh, my god, is it happening to her? 0:04:16.839 --> 0:04:20.200 She was an inspiration for Amy to come forward. I 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:27.680 have identified the real Claudia, Amy's Claudia and connected it 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:32.960 is definitely her, and that I mean, it's definitely the 0:04:33.000 --> 0:04:37.520 person Amy has pinned as the real Claudia. And guess 0:04:37.520 --> 0:04:41.640 what she was not in Amy's class. She wasn't even 0:04:41.640 --> 0:04:45.159 in Amy's school. We'll get to that, but in the 0:04:45.279 --> 0:04:51.080 interest of fairness, today we go inside Amy Griffin's counter 0:04:51.320 --> 0:04:57.360 attack her federal lawsuits. She articulates this in a complaint 0:04:57.360 --> 0:05:01.520 that she filed in federal court in Nevada against Joline 0:05:01.560 --> 0:05:06.880 Altamont June fifteenth. So this is Amy Griffin's version of events. 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:10.680 By the way, I am mentioned in this complaint by 0:05:10.760 --> 0:05:17.240 Amy's lawyers because Zach Rosenblatt, the lawyer for Joline, appeared 0:05:17.279 --> 0:05:22.520 on Hot Mike's as soon as this came out March eighteenth. 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:25.200 He was a guest on Hot Mikes and told us 0:05:25.240 --> 0:05:29.719 about what was to come from his client, Joleene Why Nevada. 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:35.839 Joline filed emotion to dismiss this case, saying defamation claims 0:05:35.880 --> 0:05:39.359 that Amy has should be resolved in California, where the 0:05:39.400 --> 0:05:43.640 original suit is all in the same place here. On Monday, 0:05:43.760 --> 0:05:46.800 Amy's lawyers rejected that they want this to remain its 0:05:46.880 --> 0:05:51.680 own federal case and to go down in Nevada. Basically, 0:05:51.760 --> 0:05:55.480 this latest back and forth is procedural, but Amy is 0:05:55.600 --> 0:05:59.640 going all in on this narrative that the New York 0:05:59.760 --> 0:06:05.440 Time James colluded with Jolene basically fed her all the 0:06:05.480 --> 0:06:09.040 information to help her build out her story, and thus 0:06:09.200 --> 0:06:14.520 Jolene defamed Amy. So more feedback from another Hot MIC's 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:17.359 viewer named Colleen Billy. I love that you are following 0:06:17.400 --> 0:06:19.919 the Amy g story. One thing I've noticed about Amy 0:06:19.960 --> 0:06:24.240 is the excessive Instagram comments she leaves on a listers pages. 0:06:24.920 --> 0:06:27.800 That is how I knew who she was before all 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:29.960 of this. I used to think, you know, that's the 0:06:30.040 --> 0:06:34.240 insecure lady who always leaves Instagram comments on every page 0:06:34.279 --> 0:06:36.479 with some personal note to make it clear that you 0:06:36.520 --> 0:06:40.240 know we're friends and I know you well and we're close. 0:06:41.440 --> 0:06:43.559 And then she said, well, take a look at Reese's page. 0:06:43.560 --> 0:06:47.479 And I looked at Reese Witherspoon's post from when Amy's 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:49.640 book came out, saying, you know, my best friend's book 0:06:49.720 --> 0:06:52.040 just came out. She's an inspiration and then I noticed 0:06:52.040 --> 0:06:57.560 that Amy's comment is the comment section is gone. I 0:06:57.560 --> 0:07:01.280 don't know who removed it, but who is is? Who 0:07:01.520 --> 0:07:06.960 is Amy Griffin? Right? You know, I've had conversations with 0:07:07.400 --> 0:07:12.640 mutual friends and acquaintances that people that know Amy and 0:07:12.840 --> 0:07:15.600 people that I know. I'm from New York. She is 0:07:15.640 --> 0:07:18.840 a New York mover and shaker. She went to UVA. 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:23.920 She's well connected. She met John Griffin, married him when 0:07:23.920 --> 0:07:26.080 she was twenty seven. He was on the cusp of 0:07:26.120 --> 0:07:28.880 his fortieth birthday. He's thirteen years older. He was already 0:07:29.000 --> 0:07:33.080 very wealthy when they got married. He graduated UVA as well, 0:07:33.120 --> 0:07:35.119 but in nineteen eighty five, then he went to Morgan 0:07:35.240 --> 0:07:39.920 Stanley and then you know the move of his life. 0:07:40.600 --> 0:07:42.640 In nineteen eighty seven, this guy became one of the 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:49.400 original Tiger Cups mentees of Julian Robertson at Tiger Management, 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:54.160 one of the biggest hedge funds. John then, after that experience, 0:07:54.200 --> 0:07:57.119 got to start Blue Ridge Capital in nineteen ninety six 0:07:57.240 --> 0:08:00.680 with approximately fifty five million dollars in essay, and when 0:08:00.720 --> 0:08:04.840 he closed it in twenty seventeen, he had twelve point 0:08:04.920 --> 0:08:11.400 four billion in his portfolio at its peak. So John 0:08:11.440 --> 0:08:13.360 and Amy ran into each other in the park. They 0:08:13.360 --> 0:08:17.040 were both runners, good timing right. They married in two 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:20.200 thousand and three. Amy describes John in the book he 0:08:20.280 --> 0:08:23.000 wasn't like other finance guys, like you know, this cocky 0:08:23.080 --> 0:08:25.760 kind of guy. He was playful, like a labrador, and 0:08:26.040 --> 0:08:29.960 just as disarming and very very rich, very rich, and 0:08:30.400 --> 0:08:33.880 i'm gonna say it, kind of handsome. Amy made moves 0:08:33.920 --> 0:08:36.800 as a mom about town in New York, all the 0:08:36.920 --> 0:08:40.479 right nonprofits and charities, the right committees, the best schools 0:08:40.559 --> 0:08:44.800 for the kids. She joined the very exclusive Maidstone Club 0:08:45.040 --> 0:08:48.800 in Easthampton, Long Island in twenty eleven. This club is 0:08:48.880 --> 0:08:52.400 old school man, multi generational kind of place. It's the 0:08:52.800 --> 0:08:58.040 the epitome of high class, but not fancy or ghoshin anyway. 0:08:58.640 --> 0:09:03.000 It's more of a say, Brooks Brothers and Volvo crowd, 0:09:03.200 --> 0:09:08.160 not chanelle. In recent years, Amy and John, according to 0:09:09.200 --> 0:09:12.480 folks out there, have kind of blown off that that 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:16.240 crowd don't don't really come around much. They've got a 0:09:16.280 --> 0:09:21.120 different crowd, a fancy crowd, an a list crowd. Roger 0:09:21.240 --> 0:09:23.480 Federer and his wife spend you know, a couple of 0:09:23.480 --> 0:09:26.679 weeks a year at Amy and John's house and well, 0:09:26.720 --> 0:09:30.800 you know the others. I get the sense John goes 0:09:30.840 --> 0:09:34.880 along with with Amy. I mean, so he's an odd labrador, 0:09:35.320 --> 0:09:41.520 intense like her. Does Ironman competitions. You know, uh, they 0:09:41.559 --> 0:09:45.560 say happy wife, happy life. That's generally accurate unless your 0:09:45.600 --> 0:09:47.439 wife is doing something stupid. And then you got to 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:52.000 speak up. Why not when you're that rich and you 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:54.200 have that much exposure, why not just pay for the 0:09:54.240 --> 0:09:59.360 best therapists and you know, continue to lay low. I mean, 0:09:59.400 --> 0:10:04.520 billionaires are generally detested, right, they have high exposure. Why 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:09.560 go worldwide? You know, sit with Oprah Winfrey and launch 0:10:09.640 --> 0:10:13.400 what Amy said, quote the idea that I had been 0:10:13.440 --> 0:10:19.000 sexually assaulted. That's word for word what she said to Oprah. 0:10:19.080 --> 0:10:22.920 I recovered in MBMA, the idea that I had been 0:10:22.960 --> 0:10:29.040 sexually assaulted, the idea. None of the big journalists and 0:10:29.400 --> 0:10:33.560 a listers, you know, asked any questions of Amy except 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:37.280 Martha Stewart. You'll hear that in a little bit. I'll 0:10:37.320 --> 0:10:39.960 tell you all about Martha Stewart's kind of lost episode. 0:10:40.000 --> 0:10:42.000 It seems to have been scrubbed by from the Internet, 0:10:42.000 --> 0:10:45.000 but Martha had a lot of questions for Amy. She 0:10:45.120 --> 0:10:48.000 was like Mike Wallace, in sixty minutes. And the other 0:10:48.040 --> 0:10:51.400 person to call into question is Amy called herself into question. 0:10:51.520 --> 0:10:54.839 Throughout the book, she writes all kinds of like incredulity. 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:57.680 She's like, how could this have happened. There's no way 0:10:57.720 --> 0:10:59.560 that this could have happened. I mean, she's sort of, 0:10:59.679 --> 0:11:04.960 you know, voicing what might be anticipated from the reader. 0:11:06.840 --> 0:11:10.000 Amy says she took about ten years off of any 0:11:10.080 --> 0:11:13.080 kind of work to raise kids before she returned as 0:11:13.120 --> 0:11:17.760 an investor of some of that Blue Ridge Capital money. 0:11:18.640 --> 0:11:22.760 She started G nine Ventures, and in twenty seventeen, as 0:11:22.840 --> 0:11:29.880 John was, you know, winding down the fund, she started 0:11:30.040 --> 0:11:34.160 the female founder investing in goop and bumble and spanks 0:11:34.160 --> 0:11:37.640 and you know, some people buy their way into the 0:11:37.720 --> 0:11:40.480 right clubs and social circles. In this case, I think 0:11:40.520 --> 0:11:47.000 she invested her way into the right female Hollywood power circles. 0:11:47.640 --> 0:11:50.240 That's Amy. I'll also say this, a lot of people 0:11:50.280 --> 0:11:53.720 said she's a nice person. She's not like some kind 0:11:53.720 --> 0:11:58.400 of hell on wheels kind of lady at all, which 0:11:58.440 --> 0:12:03.839 is good to hear. But back to Amy's Nevada federal suit. 0:12:04.160 --> 0:12:08.160 She filed it on the same day that she filed 0:12:08.320 --> 0:12:12.640 a motion to strike Joline's California suit against her. It 0:12:12.720 --> 0:12:17.559 was a busy June fifteenth. So what does Amy believe 0:12:18.280 --> 0:12:24.720 is her strongest evidence? Why did Amy's lawyers choose a 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:28.640 federal case and the timeline witnesses, you know, the villains 0:12:28.679 --> 0:12:34.080 and exhibits that it lays out. Here is the introduction, 0:12:34.480 --> 0:12:39.079 the thesis to Amy's counter attack her defamation suit filed 0:12:39.120 --> 0:12:44.000 on June fifteenth, the federal case in Nevada against Jolian Oltom, 0:12:45.080 --> 0:12:49.440 her lawyer's right. In twenty twenty five, Joline Altem told 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.600 The New York Times and through it the world, that 0:12:52.679 --> 0:12:55.440 Amy Griffin is a fraud and a thief. According to 0:12:55.480 --> 0:12:58.320 miss Altem, Miss Griffin's best selling memoir, The Tell, which 0:12:58.360 --> 0:13:02.000 recounts the brutal sexual abuse missus Griffin suffered at the 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:04.679 hands of a middle school teacher in Amarillo, Texas, is 0:13:04.720 --> 0:13:08.400 not missus Griffin's story at all. It is Miss Altam's 0:13:08.400 --> 0:13:12.000 claims her story, a story Missus Griffin pride from her 0:13:12.240 --> 0:13:16.000 through a talent agent hired to coax out its details. 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:21.360 On Miss Altham's telling, Missus Griffin stole the grape of 0:13:21.400 --> 0:13:25.160 another woman and built a best seller on it. Every 0:13:25.400 --> 0:13:31.120 element of miss Alton's account is false. The Tell recounts 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:35.480 Missus Griffin's own abuse, her very own abuse memories she 0:13:35.600 --> 0:13:38.440 recorded in writing and reported to the police before miss 0:13:38.480 --> 0:13:41.920 Altam claims they were stolen. The talent agent miss Alton 0:13:42.000 --> 0:13:46.160 identified has affirmed in an affidavit that he has never 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:50.760 spoken to missus Griffin or miss Altem, and Missus Griffin 0:13:50.800 --> 0:13:53.040 has not spoken with miss Altam since they attended the 0:13:53.080 --> 0:13:56.080 same middle school over thirty five years ago. I just 0:13:56.120 --> 0:13:58.000 saw a picture of the two of them in a yearbook. 0:13:58.880 --> 0:14:04.319 They're both there. Miss Altham's claims that missus Griffin contacted 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:05.920 her out of the blue and met her for coffee 0:14:05.920 --> 0:14:10.360 in Palm Springs in late twenty nineteen, that in twenty 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:13.160 twenty two, a man employed by Missus Griffin, imposing as 0:14:13.160 --> 0:14:15.920 a talent agent, coached the details of miss Altham's abuse 0:14:15.960 --> 0:14:20.040 from her, and that Missus Griffin appropriated miss Altem's story 0:14:20.080 --> 0:14:24.640 as her own in the Tell are all fabricated. Four 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:29.520 indisputable facts proved this. First, the meeting at the beginning 0:14:29.520 --> 0:14:33.880 of miss Altam's story never happened. Missus Griffin was not 0:14:34.040 --> 0:14:38.000 in Palm Springs in twenty nineteen or in twenty eighteen 0:14:38.680 --> 0:14:42.800 or twenty twenty, and she's never called miss Altam. By 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:46.400 the way, Katie and kc on TikTok has tracked down 0:14:46.440 --> 0:14:51.480 the tail number to John Griffin's Bombardier Global Jet and 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:55.720 traced it to those years, and seems to suggest that 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:58.280 there were some landings in the area. She very much 0:14:58.440 --> 0:15:01.840 was in the Los Angeles area, which is considered the 0:15:01.920 --> 0:15:06.800 surrounding area of Palm Springs. There was even a landing 0:15:07.080 --> 0:15:11.640 that she alleged not confirmed, but in the Mojave area, 0:15:11.680 --> 0:15:15.880 which is very close to Palm Springs. Miss Altam, for 0:15:15.960 --> 0:15:19.760 her part, has essentially conceded that she does not possess 0:15:19.760 --> 0:15:24.920 a single document, communication, photograph, or receipt, substantiating that this 0:15:25.080 --> 0:15:29.480 meeting at the center of her account occurred. The meeting 0:15:29.520 --> 0:15:35.240 cannot be corroborated because it never occurred. Missus Griffin takes 0:15:35.280 --> 0:15:40.000 no position on whether miss Altam has been said at 0:15:40.000 --> 0:15:42.600 the hands of a teacher or anyone else. Missus Griffin 0:15:42.640 --> 0:15:47.360 alleges that miss Altam's claim that she stole her story 0:15:47.840 --> 0:15:55.400 of abuse is false. In defamatory second Dominique Price, the 0:15:55.480 --> 0:16:00.680 former reality show contestant season two of Temptation Island. God, 0:16:00.720 --> 0:16:05.280 does this get weird? Right? Dominie Price, the talent agent 0:16:05.360 --> 0:16:09.880 Missus Griffin supposedly deployed to extract miss Altem's story, has sworn, 0:16:09.960 --> 0:16:13.680 under penalty of perjury, that he's never spoken with miss Altem. 0:16:13.960 --> 0:16:17.720 He's never communicated with miss Griffin or posed as a 0:16:17.760 --> 0:16:22.520 talent agent. Miss Altam played no role in the tell. 0:16:23.240 --> 0:16:25.720 Miss Altham claimed to the Times that she is a 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:29.320 character in the tell. The book refers to a woman 0:16:29.360 --> 0:16:33.640 whose pseudonym is Claudia, who attended the middle school at 0:16:33.680 --> 0:16:38.080 which Missus Griffin was graped, as told in the tale 0:16:38.080 --> 0:16:42.120 and in reality, Missus Griffin had recalled that Claudia spent 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:49.440 time around Missus Griffin's assailant when Missus Griffin did. But 0:16:49.520 --> 0:16:52.400 you're going to find out later. I'll give you a 0:16:52.440 --> 0:16:55.720 little headline now, is that Claudia, the real Claudia with 0:16:55.760 --> 0:17:01.160 whom I have connected, did not go to that middle school. 0:17:01.920 --> 0:17:07.359 She did not attend Austin Middle School. On April twenty first, 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:10.720 twenty twenty three, while she was writing to tell, Missus 0:17:10.760 --> 0:17:13.639 Griffin met with the real Claudia in a coffee shop 0:17:13.760 --> 0:17:19.800 thousands of miles from Palm Springs. Now this is in 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:22.760 a state that is a long way from California. It's 0:17:22.760 --> 0:17:27.520 in the middle of the country. That meeting was attended 0:17:27.520 --> 0:17:31.000 by Sam Lanski, who is the ghostwriter for Amy on 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:35.160 this book, and was documented thoroughly during and shortly after 0:17:35.320 --> 0:17:39.840 the coffee meeting had ended. After learning after having learned 0:17:39.840 --> 0:17:42.760 of Missus Griffin's abuse through the tell, miss Altam claimed 0:17:42.760 --> 0:17:47.120 that she is Claudia. This too is false. And of course, 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:52.040 as you know, Julian Altam has several declarations and testimonies 0:17:52.080 --> 0:17:56.320 from kids back in the day who testified that of 0:17:56.359 --> 0:17:59.879 all the descriptions and characteristics that Amy Griffin put forth 0:18:00.480 --> 0:18:03.080 in her book and in the proposal to the book 0:18:03.160 --> 0:18:09.720 describing who Claudia is, that Joline Altem checks a nine 0:18:09.760 --> 0:18:17.520 point list nine for nine. Fourth, and most importantly, Missus 0:18:17.560 --> 0:18:21.919 Griffin had already recorded her account of the abuse she 0:18:22.000 --> 0:18:26.320 suffered well before miss Altem claims that she stole it. 0:18:27.040 --> 0:18:29.639 In twenty twenty one, Missus Griffin reported her abuse in 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:33.120 great detail in a recorded interview with the Amarilla Police Department. 0:18:33.200 --> 0:18:36.400 That is true, she spoke with a Sergeant Gordon Eatley. 0:18:37.440 --> 0:18:40.679 By March twenty twenty two, Missus Griffin had finished a 0:18:40.720 --> 0:18:47.280 full draft of an article that would later become the Tell, 0:18:47.440 --> 0:18:51.720 so those details are in there. Miss Altem has had 0:18:51.720 --> 0:18:54.679 the opportunity to come clean at every step, including before 0:18:54.720 --> 0:18:57.640 the filing of this complaint. Miss Altam's attorneys have personally 0:18:57.680 --> 0:19:02.320 reviewed the evidence described above, but Miss Altam has insisted 0:19:02.400 --> 0:19:06.240 on maintaining her lives, continuing the enormous reputational harm she's 0:19:06.280 --> 0:19:09.840 already dealt. Missus Griffin, This lawsuit's purpose is to set 0:19:09.840 --> 0:19:13.879 the record straight. It ends when Miss Altam tells the 0:19:13.920 --> 0:19:22.520 truth publicly and plainly. So this federal complaint in Nevada 0:19:22.920 --> 0:19:28.600 Federal Court goes on and lists Amy's factual allegations what 0:19:29.080 --> 0:19:34.159 she is alleging here. Amy said her body kept the 0:19:34.240 --> 0:19:38.680 score for years. She knew that she was carrying something. 0:19:39.040 --> 0:19:41.120 She wrote that in the Tell as well. Back pain, 0:19:41.280 --> 0:19:48.000 ribcage pain, you know, pelvis pain. Anxiety rose within her 0:19:48.040 --> 0:19:52.440 whenever she discussed any memory from childhood, anything about childhood. 0:19:53.080 --> 0:19:55.879 A friend told her about an interaction with an older 0:19:55.920 --> 0:20:00.879 man that was unpleasant. She broke down sobbing. By the 0:20:00.920 --> 0:20:04.680 way again this kid in college, James that she writes 0:20:04.720 --> 0:20:08.080 about in the book, who forced himself non consensually on 0:20:08.200 --> 0:20:13.080 her and graped her while she was studying in the 0:20:13.119 --> 0:20:18.280 middle of her college term in Europe. You know, that 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:21.560 would be about four and a half maximum five years 0:20:22.119 --> 0:20:26.440 after the last time she was allegedly graped by this teacher. 0:20:27.840 --> 0:20:32.760 And in that four years later, you know, nothing recalled 0:20:32.880 --> 0:20:38.560 an earlier memory, a memory of just four years ago. Again, 0:20:38.680 --> 0:20:43.200 I've reached out. I've also identified who James is and 0:20:43.600 --> 0:20:47.000 I'm pretty sure that and I reached out to him. 0:20:47.960 --> 0:20:53.000 No response. Amy said she always believed that something sexual 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:55.960 in nature had happened to her, and it had. According 0:20:56.000 --> 0:20:58.720 to the book proposal, she there was a family friend 0:20:58.800 --> 0:21:01.919 she alleges that lived down on the street and he 0:21:01.960 --> 0:21:04.240 was abusive with her when she was eight years old. 0:21:04.640 --> 0:21:07.760 Now this is the source of my empathy with Amy. Again, 0:21:07.920 --> 0:21:11.399 I have no ax to grind with Amy Griffin at all. 0:21:12.080 --> 0:21:16.800 My interest here is the truth because lives have been upended. 0:21:17.440 --> 0:21:23.680 And also Psychedelic assistant therapy is a personal cause of mine. 0:21:23.160 --> 0:21:27.600 I believe it has the potential to heal the world. 0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:30.879 I really do. It's very important. It's doing wonders in 0:21:30.920 --> 0:21:34.479 the life of someone I love more than anything in 0:21:34.560 --> 0:21:42.960 this world. You know, so that's that's my purpose here. 0:21:44.240 --> 0:21:49.000 I do think, you know, something something happened to Amy Griffin. 0:21:49.080 --> 0:21:52.359 She's not just coming out of nowhere like a crazy person. 0:21:52.480 --> 0:21:55.399 I don't what the motives are. Did she get into 0:21:55.480 --> 0:21:59.920 deep or or just having a hard time connecting these things. 0:22:00.560 --> 0:22:03.600 I do think something happened to her, and if anything 0:22:03.640 --> 0:22:10.399 happened to her, my deepest, my deepest empathy, I and 0:22:10.480 --> 0:22:13.120 I don't want to see the trolling and the dragging 0:22:13.160 --> 0:22:15.159 in the and the of Amy Griffin like it's just 0:22:15.240 --> 0:22:19.600 of anyone. What's the point. But let's make what needs 0:22:19.640 --> 0:22:22.440 to be right right. You know. If that is the case, 0:22:22.520 --> 0:22:26.879 it's certainly worth asking the questions because, again of the 0:22:26.920 --> 0:22:31.640 three reasons I gave you, Amy's counsel, her legal team 0:22:31.720 --> 0:22:36.879 rights in this complaint. She has always had vivid memories 0:22:37.200 --> 0:22:42.160 of personal interactions with her assailant. Okay, so she can remember, 0:22:42.320 --> 0:22:46.639 you know him in the hallway, but not doing terrible 0:22:46.680 --> 0:22:49.439 things with bandanas and belt buckles. I don't understand this. 0:22:50.400 --> 0:22:53.840 How could you remember anything other than that about someone. 0:22:55.560 --> 0:23:00.879 Amy always held the memory of lending a dress to 0:23:01.000 --> 0:23:03.960 a classmate. She writes about this, it was very important 0:23:04.000 --> 0:23:06.840 that Amy was a good kid, and she helped this 0:23:06.960 --> 0:23:10.960 poor student, poorer girl in her class, you know, wear 0:23:11.000 --> 0:23:12.959 a dress to the dance. It made her feel good 0:23:13.000 --> 0:23:17.440 about herself, which is nice, and that would be as 0:23:17.480 --> 0:23:22.480 Amy says, the real Claudia. But all of Amy's experiences 0:23:22.560 --> 0:23:24.800 and the pain welling up inside of her, and that 0:23:24.880 --> 0:23:29.000 eerie feeling that something had happened in sexual in nature 0:23:29.520 --> 0:23:33.160 all came to a head when Amy writes that her 0:23:33.200 --> 0:23:37.080 ten year old confronted her saying, Mom, there's a lack 0:23:37.119 --> 0:23:40.359 of connection. You're this perfectionist, You're too perfect. I feel 0:23:40.359 --> 0:23:44.399 like you're here but not here. In the book, she says, 0:23:44.440 --> 0:23:47.480 here but not here. On Oprah, when she was telling 0:23:47.520 --> 0:23:50.040 the story, she said that her daughter told her, you're 0:23:50.119 --> 0:23:53.879 there but not there. Now, I know it's a small 0:23:53.960 --> 0:23:58.880 change here and there, same thing, but boy, something so 0:23:59.640 --> 0:24:02.239 pivotal coming from a ten year old, you know, the 0:24:02.280 --> 0:24:06.240 mouth of babes, you know, which compels you to go 0:24:06.440 --> 0:24:10.200 and discover your childhood traumatic memories and write a book 0:24:10.280 --> 0:24:14.200 and make this incredible platform. I don't know, I think 0:24:14.240 --> 0:24:22.560 you'd remember exactly what your child said. She tried, Amy says, 0:24:22.600 --> 0:24:26.120 to you know, cope using the usual methods of running 0:24:26.160 --> 0:24:29.720 and overworking and raising kids and running you know, to 0:24:29.840 --> 0:24:33.639 and from you know, camps and pickups. And but John, 0:24:33.720 --> 0:24:39.200 her husband, she says, you know, suggested MDMA, and Amy 0:24:39.320 --> 0:24:42.040 warmed up to it. She kind of a goodie two shoes, 0:24:42.280 --> 0:24:45.840 she said, didn't doesn't connect with drugs and didn't do 0:24:45.880 --> 0:24:48.800 any drugs, never did anything like that. But she thought okay, 0:24:49.720 --> 0:24:54.440 and she did it. Her first session was July nineteenth, 0:24:54.640 --> 0:25:00.840 twenty twenty, and she told the facilitator right off the bat, 0:25:01.480 --> 0:25:06.520 something happened to me, but I can't remember. Within minutes 0:25:06.720 --> 0:25:13.560 of the first administering of MDMA, and her lawyers say, 0:25:13.800 --> 0:25:18.000 well before it fully took effect, missus Griffin sat up 0:25:18.040 --> 0:25:23.840 and asked, why is he here, meaning the teacher who 0:25:24.119 --> 0:25:30.000 allegedly violently graped and assaulted her back in middle school. 0:25:30.800 --> 0:25:35.960 And she then describes what he did, what he allegedly did, 0:25:36.520 --> 0:25:40.240 the brutal graping scenes, the belt buckle on the floor 0:25:40.320 --> 0:25:43.359 as you know, the bandana, tied her hands behind the back, 0:25:45.200 --> 0:25:48.880 defiling her mouth and dragging her across the floor and 0:25:49.160 --> 0:25:51.880 threatening to rip her teeth out, and smashing her head 0:25:51.880 --> 0:25:57.040 against the wall. Many different locations, the bathroom being the 0:25:57.080 --> 0:26:02.520 central one. She says a detective in Amarillo concluded her 0:26:02.520 --> 0:26:06.439 account was very credible after she told him. However, she 0:26:06.520 --> 0:26:09.600 never told that detective that she had taken MDMA to 0:26:09.640 --> 0:26:12.440 recover them. And of course, now her lawyers are saying 0:26:12.960 --> 0:26:15.960 the memories were recovered before the medicine kicked in. This 0:26:16.359 --> 0:26:20.720 is getting webby. Her lawyers added it to her Nevada complaint. 0:26:20.880 --> 0:26:24.520 Here's the exact verbiage. An expert in MDMA therapy has 0:26:24.560 --> 0:26:27.720 since reviewed missus Griffin's memories and concluded that they were 0:26:27.800 --> 0:26:31.560 recovered before the drug took effect. Straight up legal ease 0:26:32.359 --> 0:26:36.359 and not what the book says. No, the book's entire 0:26:36.480 --> 0:26:41.400 premise is that the memories were recovered thanks to MDMA. 0:26:42.400 --> 0:26:45.520 Amy says in the complaint that her PR team pitched 0:26:45.720 --> 0:26:47.840 the New York Times to cover the release of the 0:26:47.840 --> 0:26:50.920 book when it came out. Maybe write a spotlight piece. 0:26:50.960 --> 0:26:53.200 What could be better than a New York Times book 0:26:53.240 --> 0:26:58.280 review the New York Times. I guess had other plans, 0:26:58.359 --> 0:27:04.720 it turns out and investigation. Amy certainly calls Joline a 0:27:04.840 --> 0:27:09.280 liar in her Nevada complaint, but her lawyers want to 0:27:09.320 --> 0:27:13.120 focus now on the New York Times. They accuse one 0:27:13.160 --> 0:27:17.919 of the two female journalists, Katie Rossman, of professional jealousy 0:27:18.640 --> 0:27:21.719 when she wrote that article The Billionaire, the Psychedelics and 0:27:22.920 --> 0:27:26.600 you know recovered stolen Memories or recovered Memories. I can't 0:27:26.600 --> 0:27:30.280 remember the title, but it was the big you know, 0:27:30.600 --> 0:27:35.120 check yourself article that started all of this. Amy's legal 0:27:35.160 --> 0:27:39.520 team asserts that Katie Rossman and her partner Liz Egan 0:27:39.640 --> 0:27:46.159 interviewed at least eighty people, old classmates, neighbors, MDMA, and 0:27:46.440 --> 0:27:50.960 medical community people. They accuse The New York Times of 0:27:51.080 --> 0:27:57.240 asking leading questions to achieve their premeditated objective to take 0:27:57.359 --> 0:28:01.919 down Amy Griffin. Subjects who said they were inclined to 0:28:02.080 --> 0:28:07.520 believe missus Griffin, her lawyers say were omitted from the article. 0:28:08.480 --> 0:28:13.280 The New York Times pair of Rossman and Egan obtained 0:28:13.320 --> 0:28:18.560 the confidential, watermarked version of the book Proposal when the 0:28:18.680 --> 0:28:23.080 book was originally called Believe Me, and in it there 0:28:23.119 --> 0:28:27.440 were real names and the Foster home where Jolene went, 0:28:27.680 --> 0:28:30.879 and you know, details that didn't make it to the book. 0:28:31.880 --> 0:28:34.560 And the lawyers say this is how the New York 0:28:34.560 --> 0:28:38.400 Times found Joline, who by the way, had not read 0:28:38.560 --> 0:28:42.920