SUBWAY JARED GOING TO PRISON

Subway’s celebrated pitchman, ditched as word leaked that he would be pleading guilty to child-sex and -porn charges, will spend at least five years in prison and pay $1.4 million to his victims after striking a deal with federal prosecutors, according to court documents released Wednesday.

Jared Fogle, 37, of Zionsville, Ind., commissioned the executive director of his charity to produce pornography using at least a dozen underage victims, one as young as 6, the charging documents say. Fogle jetted numerous times to New York City to have sex with at least two underage girls.

“This is about using wealth, status and secrecy to illegally exploit children,” U.S. Attorney Josh Minkler said.

Fogle repeatedly made his travel plans for sex to coincide with his business trips, according to the charging documents.
Fogle first appeared in a Subway ad in 2000 after losing 245 pounds on his famous Subway diet in 1998; he created his nonprofit Jared Foundation to raise awareness about childhood obesity in 2004. And his estimated $15 million net worth accumulated since then is directly attributable to personal appearances and his more than 300 ads for the sandwich-shop franchise, according to celebritynetworth.com.

He married for the second time in 2010. His wife, Katie McLaughlin Fogle, said Wednesday that she is filing for divorce.

“My focus is exclusively on the well-being of my children,” she said through her lawyers. She and Jared Fogle have two children together.

Authorities reviewed 47,000 emails and text messages as part of their investigation into Jared Fogle, Minkler said.

In a federal court appearance Wednesday in Indianapolis, Jared Fogle sat with his head down and hands clasped. He nodded affirmatively and spoke softly in response to questions from U.S. Magistrate Judge Mark Dinsmore asking whether he understood the charges and proceedings.

He is expected to plead guilty at a later date on one count each of traveling to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor and distribution and receipt of child pornography. He has waived his right to appeal.
For now, he is being placed on home detention with GPS monitoring and is not in jail. The date of his next court appearance has not been set, and the government, which said its investigation is ongoing, reserves the right to present additional evidence when Jared Fogle is sentenced.

Prosecutors agreed to seek a sentence no greater than 12½ years though the judge ultimately will decide how much time Jared Fogle will spend in federal prison. Jared Fogle agreed not to seek a sentence of less than five years, and he will have to register as a sex offender when he leaves prison.

In federal cases, prisoners must serve at least 85% of their sentences.

As the explicit revelations unfolded Wednesday, numerous supporters backed away from the slimmed-down celeb who appeared five times in the past five years on The Biggest Loser TV series.

• Subway, which had suspended its relationship with him hours after investigators raided his home July 7 in Indiana, repeated its decision to fire Jared Fogle via Twitter.

“Jared Fogle’s actions are inexcusable and do not represent our brand’s values,” the company said via Twitter. “We had already ended our relationship with Jared.”

• Jared ​Fogle’s family expressed shock and disappointment.

“We are very concerned for the well being of those affected by his conduct,” family members said in a statement. He is the son of Dr. Norman and Adrienne Fogle of Indianapolis. “At the same time, we are gratified that Jared is accepting responsibility for what he has done by agreeing to plea guilty to the charges filed today and by volunteering to make restitution to the victims.”

Jared Fogle will pay the 14 victims $100,000 each to help with their medical treatment, counseling and education. Four of the victims are now adults in desperate straits, Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven DeBrota said.

Jared Fogle repeatedly asked one of the minor victims and other adults who were escort-service employees to “provide him with access to minors as young as 14 years” for sex. To make sure that the escorts weren’t cops, he had sex with them and offered a finder’s fee if they could provide him with underage prostitutes.
The younger the girl, the better,” he told one of the victims. Jared Fogle said he would “really make it worth her while if she could find one.”

Jared Fogle started his solicitation of adult prostitutes in 2007, the charging documents say. And he would arrange these activities during his business trips, both across the USA and in foreign countries.

2007 was the same year Jared Fogle hired Russell C. Taylor of Indianapolis as executive director of the Jared Foundation. The two had met through Taylor’s previous work as youth market director for the American Heart Association of Indiana.

Jared Fogel and his first wife, Elizabeth Christie Fogle, divorced in October 2007 after six years of marriage.

At New York’s Plaza Hotel, Jared Fogle cavorted with one 17-year-old victim, knowing she was underage and giving her money for sex. Then two months later, he paid for sex with the same teen at the Ritz Carlton and continued to have liaisons with her.

Taylor, now 43, supplied Jared Fogle with homemade child pornography, including victims as young as 6, on multiple occasions between 2011 and this year, the charging documents say.

Then Jared Fogle learned that Taylor was sexually exploiting a 14-year-old girl, Minkler said.

“Mr. Fogle did nothing to stop the abuse or report it to authorities but chose instead to receive and repeatedly view the child pornography involving the girl and … other minors,” Minkler said. “He preyed on minor victims who did not have the ability to protect themselves.”

A tip from a woman who contacted Indiana State Police prompted the investigation into Taylor, court records said. The woman said Taylor, among other things, offered to send her images and video of young girls by text messaging.

Jared Fogle apparently chose to continue his behavior after Taylor’s arrest April 29 on preliminary child pornography charges.

Jared Fogle fired Taylor soon after Taylor’s arrest, saying he was shocked and that the foundation was severing all ties with the colleague who often accompanied him to the charitable events. Taylor attempted suicide a week after his arrest while in custody at the Marion County Jail here and remains in federal custody.

Yet Jared Fogle’s charging documents contend he repeatedly traveled to engage in commercial sexual activity until on or about June 23. Jared Fogle’s home was raided July 7.

Jared Fogle’s lawyer, Jeremy Margolis, said his client is acknowledging responsibility for his wrongdoing and volunteering to pay restitution to help his victims recover.

Margolis said Jared Fogle will be undertaking significant psychiatric treatment and counseling and already has been examined by a world-renowned expert to chart a course for his recovery.

“Jared understands that he has hurt innocent people, vulnerable people, and his family,” Margolis said. “He has expressed remorse to me and to his loved ones, and will, when given the opportunity, express that remorse to this court and to the people he has harmed. His intent is to spend the rest of his life making amends.”

INDIANAPOLIS – Longtime Subway pitchman Jared Fogle capitalized on his business trips to New York City to arrange sexual encounters with minors in luxury hotels, federal prosecutors said in charging the Indiana man in a case that also documented his acceptance of child pornography from a close associate.

Fogle agreed Wednesday to plead guilty to allegations that he paid for sex with girls as young as 16 and received child pornography. The case already has destroyed his career with the sandwich-shop chain and could send him to prison for more than a decade.

Prosecutors allege Fogle knew the pornography he received had been secretly produced by the former director of his charitable foundation, which sought to raise awareness about childhood obesity and arranged for Fogle to visit schools and urge children to adopt healthy eating and exercise habits.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Steven DeBrota said Fogle used his trips to New York on behalf of both Subway and his Jared Foundation to seek out child prostitutes for sex.

“We’re dealing with a celebrity who had the access, power and resources to do anything he wanted to do in the world but he chose to utilize that to cajole, convince and even take advantage of children,” said Indianapolis Police Chief Rick Hite, whose department helped analyze evidence seized July 7 from Fogle’s suburban Indianapolis home.

DeBrota stressed that “at no event was he using the foundation to get at the child prostitutes.”

The court document detailing the charges against Fogle states that he paid for sex at New York City hotels with two girls under age 18, one of whom was 17. The plea agreement refers to the two as being 16 and says that one of them also had sex with Fogle after she turned 17. Federal prosecutors could not explain the discrepancy between the two documents.

Authorities also said Fogle offered to pay adult prostitutes a finder’s fee if they could connect him with minors for sex acts, including some as young as 14 or 15 years old.

A tight-lipped Fogle sat in federal court during his initial hearing with his hands clasped and quietly answered “no” when the judge asked whether he had any questions about his rights. He is expected to enter the formal plea at a later date to one count each of travelling to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor and distribution and receipt of child pornography.

The agreement released by prosecutors said Fogle will pay $1.4 million in restitution to 14 minor victims, who will each receive $100,000. He will also be required to register as a sex offender and undergo treatment for sexual disorders.

The government agreed not to seek a sentence of more than 12½ years in prison, and Fogle agreed not to ask for less than five years, according to court documents.

Federal judges have wide discretion in sentencing, and Fogle could get a longer sentence. The child-porn charge carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison. The count involving sex with a minor is punishable by up to 30 years.

Fogle “knows that restitution can’t undo the damage that he’s done, but he will do all in his power to try to make it right,” defense attorney Jeremy Margolis told reporters.

The married father of two, he added, has a “medical problem” and “expects to get well,” but he did not elaborate.

Fogle, 37, whose wife filed for divorce Wednesday, became Subway’s pitchman after shedding more than 200 pounds as a college student, in part by eating the chain’s sandwiches. He was the public face of the company for more than 15 years — a period in which its number of locations tripled, making Subway the world’s largest restaurant chain.

Subway suspended the partnership in July after agents raided his home in the affluent Indianapolis suburb of Zionsville, and the chain said this week that it had ended its relationship with Fogle.

Federal prosecutors allege in the documents that Fogle traveled to pay for sex acts, including with minors, from 2007 until as recently as June and that he repeatedly planned business trips to coincide with his sexual pursuits.

Fogle is accused of having sex with two 16-year-old girls at hotels in New York City. One of the girls told investigators she had sex with Fogle three times in November 2012, when she was 16, and again two months later, when she was 17.

The girl told Fogle her age when they first met, according to the court documents.

After that meeting, Fogle allegedly texted the girl and offered to pay her a fee if she could find him another underage girl to pay for sex acts.

During these discussions, Fogle “stated that he would accept a 16-year-old girl, while stating that the younger the girl, the better,” the documents said.

Posts to social media place Fogle in New York around the dates of the alleged sex acts.

The documents also alleged that Fogle on multiple occasions received sexually explicit images and videos produced by Russell Taylor, 43, who ran the charitable Jared Foundation.

Two months before Fogle’s home was raided, authorities arrested Taylor on charges that he produced and possessed child pornography. Investigators said they discovered a cache of sexually explicit photos and videos Taylor allegedly produced by secretly filming minor children at his home.

Prosecutors also allege that Fogle received from Taylor multiple images and videos, some of which were taken by a video camera hidden in a clock radio that filmed children changing clothes or bathing. Some were taken in buildings were Taylor lived.

The documents said Fogle knew those depicted were minors, some as young as 13 or 14 years old, and in some cases knew the minors involved by name and had met them “during social events in Indiana.”
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