A successful home designer in his 50s met a doctor on a dating website. After several romantic disappointments, this man seems to be the one. Affectionate, caring and seductive, he always seems to be right. Is this the beginning of a love story? Well, no, on the contrary, this is the beginning of a dramatic fight for survival.
Produced by Bravo and recently released to the world on Netflix, Dirty John tells the true story of Debra Newell, the last woman deceived by the liar and stalker John “Dirty” Meehan. The suspense series starring actors Connie Britton and Eric Barner shows us 8 episodes of this pathological liar, who has been accused of various crimes throughout his life and managed to escape most of his punishment.
But how did the disturbing real cases that inspired this series of works unfold? What happened to the lives of the women who lived the worst nightmares with this dangerous psychopath? In this note we will tell you everything about this particular story, which transcends any type of novel.
“Dirty John” is an adaptation of the popular podcast of the same name presented by journalist Christopher Goffard and produced by the Los Angeles Times in 2017. It features Debra Newell, who recounts the tragic events in which she and her family they were victims.
In October 2014, Debra met John online and they went on their first date at a restaurant in Irvine, California. This woman, who has been married 4 times and has four children, believes that her image as a divorcee and as a Catholic is exactly the same as her. When they first met, she was treated as an anesthetist. She fascinated by the history of the teacher in Iraq and the United States. MSF. Obviously, John is not like the other boring dates of hers. He is interested in learning all of her about her and hers her business of design from her Ambrosia interior design from hers. Despite her out of place appearance, Debra seemed confused by this man. Just two days before meeting her, he was jailed for violating the restraining order requested by her ex-girlfriend. John sent her a series of threatening letters and her intimate photos of her. family.
After about three dates, John tells Debra that he loves her and wants to marry her. It wasn’t enough for the designer to let John spend the night at her luxurious residence in Irving, where he lived with her 24-year-old daughter Jacqueline (she was renamed “Veronica” in the series and played by Juno). . ). John’s continued existence was not well received by Jacqueline. He thought he was dressed as a homeless man, worrying about the way he viewed the valuables in the house and his interest in the room safe. He took his A collection of things in the wallet.
The tension between her family and John kept growing, and that’s when Debra decided to move into a house on Balboa Island in Newport Beach after just five weeks of meeting her partner indoors. Of course, her Debra never said anything to her children, the first thing she found was her 23-year-old daughter, Tyra, played by Julia Garner on the show. The young woman ran away from the house at Thanksgiving dinner and got into an intense fight with her mother in the presence of John, who suggested that she slap her. “How can you let this boy talk to me like that ?!” Tyra yelled at her mother and left with her boyfriend, wounding deeply.
This is not an obstacle for the anesthesiologist to convince Debra to secretly marry in Las Vegas in December 2014, when they were both on business trips.
In March 2015, Debra finally discovered the truth behind her husband. Thanks to the investigation by Jacquelyn, who hired a private detective, and her nephew Shad’s insistence on worrying about her aunt, Debra learned that John not only lied about his Ph.D., but also hid his drug addiction. . A long history of crimes. , including stealing drugs, possession of weapons, cheating and harassing various women, and she has spent some time in prison. Before Debra, six women sued Meehan, including his ex-wife and mother of two daughters, Tonya. Once these women discovered John’s deception and decided to leave, the mental patient used the dissemination of private photos of him to retaliate, a situation that led his victims to request a restraining order.
“Every breath of mine will ruin your life,” one of the many anonymous letters John wrote to his ex. In February 2014, Meehan admitted to following a 48-year-old Laguna Beach woman who was recovering after undergoing brain surgery at a San Diego hospital. After dating for a while, she suggested that he transfer the money to an account. She refused. In retaliation, she sent nude photos to her family and continued to threaten her anonymously. After pleading guilty, John only stayed in prison for a few months.
John Meehan served to track. Source: www.latimes.com
This is how Debra took advantage of John being sent to the hospital for back surgery to pack up and leave his beach house for good.
But this situation continued for a long time. After being harassed by text messages and phone calls for two months, Debra finally forgave John and they reconciled.
“He always has stories. He told me that he lied because he thought he would lose me. He was lucky to be such a tolerant person. He is the love of this life. I made him a better person,” Bla said on the podcast. .
In March 2016, Debra, who had been completely alienated from her family, managed to leave John for good, and criminals began retaliating for this. The information threats, theft and burning of her car were enough for the designer to request a restraining order from an Orange County judge, but the judge denied the request. The judge stated that Meehan currently lives in Nevada and has never physically harmed Debra, so there is no imminent threat.
August 20, 2016 was the day John’s nightmare reached its climax. Jacqueline warned her sister Tyra that Mihan was in town because she had seen him outside her building. That night, when she was returning from work, Tyra was attacked with a knife by John in the parking lot of her apartment. After a fierce fight in which her dog bit the stalker’s ankle, Tyra managed to grab Meehan’s knife and stabbed him 13 times, one of which was through her left eye. “I thought, ‘I don’t want him to get up, I don’t want him to try to hurt me again. If he gets up, he will kill me,'” Terra told Fox5.
Four days after the attack, John Meehan died in hospital after being pronounced brain dead. At age 57, his sister Karen decided to take away the ventilator.
