Will the health-conscious sandwich peddlers over at Subway ever truly be free of the public relations scourge that is Jared Fogle? Or will Jared’s grasp on the world’s largest restaurant chain prove to be longer than a thousand meatball subs?
That’s the question we are left asking ourselves after it was announced that Katie McLaughlin, the ex-wife of the disgraced former spokesman, is now suing the chain for damages, alleging that they knew of his pedophilia as early as 2004 and did nothing to stop it.
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The lawsuit, which was filed on behalf of McLaughlin in an Indiana superior court yesterday, alleges that Subway received at least three reports on Fogle’s sexual misdeeds, yet not failed to alert the authorities, but continued to have Fogle promote the brand at elementary schools. Fogle is currently serving more than 15 years in federal prison and has agreed to pay 14 of his victims $100,000 each.
“Finding out that Subway did not act upon at least one complaint while continuing to utilize Jared as their spokesperson and facilitate his visits to those hundreds of schools is beyond comprehension,” McLaughlin said during during a press conference yesterday.
According to the lawsuit, Subway had a PR employee question Fogle about two of the allegations mentioned in the suit; Fogle denied the accusations. McLaughlin’s lawsuit claims that the sandwich chain actually admitted that the third report of abuse was “not properly escalated or acted upon.”
One instance detailed in the lawsuit regards Subway franchisee Cindy Mills, who called the company’s CEO in 2008 to notify him that Fogle had told her that “he really liked them young,” and had previously had sex with children between the ages of 9 and 12. The lawsuit goes on to allege that then-CEO Jeff Moody interrupted Mills and told her, “Please don’t tell me any more. Don’t worry, he has met someone. She is a teacher and he seems to love her very much, and we think she will keep him grounded.”
Moody is also said to have told Mills that he received similar complaints previously. The teacher Moody referenced was evidently McLaughlin, whom he later married.
“A responsible corporation would take immediate action when hearing of this behavior, even if it was only allegations,” McLaughlin states in the suit. “Subway failed every test of corporate responsibility in its response to each of these complaints.
McLaughlin, who divorced Fogle after he pled guilty to child pornography charges and having sex with minors, is accusing Subway of negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress, and the invasion of privacy via the misappropriation of likeness—the company evidently used images of McLaughlin and her kids in ads without her approval. “Subway’s ambition for sales and growth came at the expense of Katie [and her children],” states the lawsuit.
A spokesperson for Subway responded to our request for comment with the following: “As this is pending legal action, we cannot provide comment.”
Subway may indeed have decided back in 2015 that they are more than done with their one-time poster child, but that doesn’t mean that Jared is entirely done with Subway.
