Rick Saleeby, Jake Tapper’s former producer at CNN, has resigned and is now under investigation by law enforcement after text messages of his were made public by Project Veritas. The texts showed him soliciting photos of underaged girls and describing in graphic detail what he wanted to do sexually with his fiancee’s teen daughter.
The man, Rick Saleeby, a former senior producer at the network, is being investigated by detectives of the child exploitation unit of the Fairfax County Police Department’s Major Crimes Bureau, the police department confirmed in a statement Thursday. A spokesman for the police department said he was not able to provide additional details.
“While we will eventually be transparent about our findings, safeguarding the personal privacy and safety of victims and witnesses as well as maintaining the integrity of our criminal investigation are of paramount importance,” the statement said.
One of the worst parts of this story is that the woman who blew the whistle on Saleeby, Janine Bonnani, a former sex worker and victim of human trafficking, had taken her evidence to the police, and they refused to do anything about it. After Project Veritas got involved, suddenly it’s worth investigating.
“I met [Saleeby] about ten years ago when I was being trafficked,” said Bonnani. “I was on BackPage and he called to buy sex from me and I went to the casino and that’s how everything started. I feel he thinks he can confide in me with everything because of my past and everything I’ve been through, but it’s the exact opposite. … it has infuriated me.”
Related: FBI Arrests CNN Staffer for Enticing Minors for Sex
Saleeby’s fiancé wrote a letter to Project Veritas, thanking them for bringing the texts to her attention and reporting that she left Saleeby and protected her daughter from him.
I wanted to reach out to sincerely thank you again. I am very grateful toward you guys and everything you’ve done for me and my children. Our world has just been completely flipped upside down, but none of that matters. We are all safe. I’m hoping, praying, and pushing for charges to be brought against him, so he can never do this to another child/family again.
I want the public and any predators to know, without a shadow of a doubt, that I will go to the absolute ends of the earth to protect my babies. And I am tremendously grateful that you guys have saved us all from him.
Despite the hardships ahead, I am going to continue to sit with these feelings of gratitude toward you guys and the woman who provided you with the information. Gratitude will get us through to the other side of all this. Thank you from the bottom of my heart and Merry Christmas. ❤️”
The investigation into Saleeby comes right on the heels of the arrest of another CNN producer, John Griffin, who was Chris Cuomo’s senior producer. Griffin was arrested and charged with trafficking a minor after he allegedly flew a mother and her 9-year-old daughter across state lines in order to rape the child. Griffin, like Saleeby, fantasized about “mother-daughter” sex.
These two incidents should spark a company-wide investigation to find out if CNN has a pedophile ring operating within it, but don’t count on it. CNN hasn’t even reported that Rick Saleeby has resigned and been arrested for his alleged activities with minors. Why is that?
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