By Craig Ballantyne and John Powell – Slam Wrestling
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Janel Grant has spoken out publicly for the first time since filing a lawsuit against Vince McMahon and the WWE.
In the ongoing case, Grant has accused the WWE and Vince McMahon with sex trafficking and sexual assault. Former WWE executive John Laurinaitis was also a plaintiff in the suit but was later dismissed from the lawsuit after reaching a confidential settlement and agreeing to provide evidence against McMahon and WWE.
Grant appeared at the Hartford Legislative Office Building to speak about her experiences and lobby the legislature to make the federal Prison Rape Elimination Act (PREA) part of Connecticut state law so prisons and detention centres must follow its protections and to change state rules around non-disclosure agreements (NDAs). She and others believe they have been used to silence survivors and hide abuse.
She also spoke about the financial and psychological toll her case has had on her, including a suicide attempt.
Grant said she felt pressured into signing the agreement with WWE and decided to come forward to get “ownership” of her story and potentially encourage other potential victims to come forward too.
Discussing the difficulties of being under an NDA, Grant recalled being contacted by the Wall Street Journal, informing her they would be publishing their initial story about McMahon and the WWE.
“By a series of miracles that I can’t account for, I’m alive today,” began Grant holding back tears.
“On June 15th, 2022, my life was rewritten into someone else’s storyline and I was globally outed in the Wall Street Journal. I got a call that I didn’t expect. On the day of a very big meeting of a new job I had and it was in front of my new bosses and it was in front of a high-rise full of residents whose homes I was entrusted to protect,” she began.
Grant explained, because of the NDA she signed the restrictions she faced.
“I was told, if anybody asks me about this I can’t make a comment. I can’t acknowledge it. I can’t say I’m not okay and if anybody approaches me I can’t acknowledge years of life to people who saw me live it and it was like somebody set fire to my home intentionally with me still inside of it. So, I blacked out and I ended up in a closet with a belt and a stool placed under a metal rod,” she said crying.
Grant said someone saw her and stopped her from going through her suicide attempt.
“That is the life wrecking, the mental health impact of this particular NDA…The people and organizations that stuck with me when I was the loneliest person on planet Earth when my life got decimated in the Wall Street Journal, without them I would not be here,” she said.
Calling for NDA reform, Grant explained that the agreements can be used to conceal dangerous behaviour in the workplace.
“When employees cannot speak, patterns cannot be seen. When patterns cannot be seen they cannot be stopped. When they cannot be stopped, harm spreads. When NDAs are used to conceal dangerous behaviour it simply relocates the harm to the next employee, the next office, the next victim. No one should be required to trade silence for accountability and no workplace to be able to become safer for an institution than the people inside of it,” she said.
Grant stated that for years now she has watched her life “play outside a window” and that she only went outside a total of ten times last year.
“That is the level of threat, that is the level of feeling unsafe, that is the level of power I am on the other side of,” she explained.
She said because of the NDA she signed she has “seen the worst of humanity” and has seen “some of the best colours in people”.
“I might be leaving here the same way I arrived, which is deeply struggling, financially devastated, no family, isolated, but right now I am in a dress and I am smiling,” she said thanking everyone in attendance.
According to Grant, NDAs have led to “a lot of people working in fear here in Connecticut” and she believes her experience can be seen as the “number one cautionary tale of what you do not want under an NDA.”
She then went onto chronicle what the NDA has triggered including a Department of Justice investigation, a pending shareholder lawsuit and her civil suit. Grant called it a massive “pile-up” from one NDA.
“This NDA was a tool that Vince (McMahon) could use to justify anything while I remained in a system for exploitation and actually in a position for anyone to exploit me,” said Grant.
Grant claimed the WWE asked her to make a public statement that the affair with Vince McMahon was a consensual relationship. When she declined to do so Grant claims a company representative stated that publicly. Grant also said the WWE invited her to join the company investigation into McMahon’s dealings but didn’t consider that a breach of the NDA.
“Here’s the part that I’ve been really waiting to say, that summer I spent six figures to participate in this thing, their investigation on new legal retainers and on medical care that saved my life. I preserved my evidence. I believed that somehow I would be interviewed for this investigation and get my life back and figure out what happened. Then the feds reached out ahead of speaking with me. I was on-boarding a brand-new legal team. So while our hair was on fire and getting everyone on-boarded we gave them my evidence and said, review this in advance. Based on that objective review of hard evidence, communications with people across the company and that leadership then and now, the feds informed us that this was now a covert investigation into human trafficking and the criminal misconduct of WWE, Vince McMahon and this NDA,” she said explaining why her case is a civil case not an employment lawsuit is because federal authorities wanted her to remain silent while they conducted their criminal investigation,” she said.
She stated the WWE is full of people “working in fear” and “intimidating” people she cares about.
“So, while I was preparing to participate with the DOJ and the SEC and the company’s independent investigation, the company’s case was closed without speaking to me. I couldn’t share that with anybody. I’m under an NDA. I am going to speed skate like the Olympics through 2023 because I promise you this keeps building up. There are people living and working in fear here and there is a headquarters in Stamford, Connecticut, right now that is full of intimidating people that I care very much about,” she claimed.
Grant says she didn’t really want to file the suit because she knew what she would be facing but the NDA dragged her into the broad and far-reaching situation with Vince McMahon and WWE.
“I didn’t start that. It found me,” she said.
Now, she is proud to be the face of those who have no voice.
“I put myself in the shoes of everyone I knew. Everyone I worked with. Anyone who lost a job, has been intimidated, who has told something and got no answers. I put my name and my face on it,” she said.
Grant addressed the “love letter” she supposedly wrote to McMahon that was reported by the press.
“The article also rewrote my life again. This was a public humiliation and an intimidation of a person who gets letters from the FBI that say “victim” and it’s also witness intimidation, discouraging others from speaking out, speaking to, or even associating with me for fear of their own well-being and their families.” she said.
Grant also commented on a storyline on WWE TV that mirrored her own experience as evidence that the WWE wasn’t a safe environment.
“So, does it look like we work in a safe environment when the destination point, if you are hurt, is weaponized use of your experience on live TV every Monday night for months by their actions and by their reactions? This is a lot more about current leadership than it says about me,” she stated.
She then addressed the board of TKO, the company that now owns WWE.
“If you didn’t know this part of your origin story, now you know. I hope you will have conversations with us. I hope you have conversations among yourselves and I hope that you don’t rely on old instincts with new insight,” she said.
Grant concluded with the hope that telling the story of her NDA will lead “to dignified and productive conversations that create solutions.”
