Who Is Dirty John Based On? The podcast Dirty John is based on the real-life criminal career of one John Michael Meehan. Christopher Goffard is the host of this podcast that was produced by Wondery and the Los Angeles Times.
On October 2, 2017, the first two chapters were released, with the remaining four appearing over the course of the following days. Within the first six weeks of its debut, the podcast was downloaded over 10 million times.
Who Is Dirty John Based On?
The true story that Dirty John is based on reveals how con artist John Meehan victimized Debra Newell and her loved ones. In 2014, Debra Newell met 55-year-old John Meehan on a dating app. At first glance, he seemed too good to be true: a hulking, attractive, and doting physician and war vet with a kind heart. John’s sister Donna (he also has a brother and a sister) said that her brother was “born into hustling.”
John and his sister Karen were raised in San Jose by their father (played in the series by Whigham), who operated a seedy casino and surrounded himself with low-level con artists. (Debra plays both sisters in the Bravo series.) John was smart and well-liked at school, but he was easily influenced by his father’s advice to cheat and lie.
By the time he enrolled at the University of Dayton School of Law in the late ’80s, John had already been expelled from California as part of a plea deal for drug dealing and had been kicked out of many other schools.
Tonia Sells (Grayden), a nurse in her mid-20s, was his sweetheart during this period; they soon wed, and she supported him financially as he went to school to become an anesthetist. They even started a family, having twins.
Tonia claims that John’s mother and sisters informed her that he had lied about his family history after she discovered that he was having an affair. To add insult to injury, he was hooked on the opioids he was prescribing and was taking them from his patients.
After his marriage fell apart, John began doing drugs and eventually spent a lot of time in jail for various crimes before he learned to con his way around the outside world by preying on lonely, unmarried women (including against his own attorneys).
By the time he wormed his way into Newell’s life and married her in a hasty ceremony in Las Vegas in late 2014, John was an opiate addict with a long criminal record that included convictions for stalking, weapons possession, and more.
Where Is John Meehan Now?
Four days after his fight with Terra, John Meehan, age 57, passed away in the hospital. His sister, Karen, made the call to turn off life support after a medical examiner ruled that he was permanently brain dead. No memorial service was held, and his remains were cremated.
Source: LA Times
The nightmare relationship Debra had with John, she said Fox5, was the impetus for her work with domestic violence survivors. ‘There are ladies who are undoubtedly terrified to death to leave,’ she said. “I want to speak up for [them] because they don’t see a path out of the relationship.”
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