And I thought Jake was the loser...

https://okmagazine.com/p/josh-harris-axed-deadliest-catch-sexual-assault-allegations/

According to reports, Harris, who was supposedly 15 or 16 at the time, allegedly digitally, vaginally, and orally assaulted a 4-year-old girl. "SSG detectives went to the victim's residence and collected some further evidence," the arrest report stated, noting that Harris' semen was "found at the scene of the crime."

However, according to the paperwork, the reality star was not taken into custody and arrested until 1999 due to a delay in DNA processing. In the end, Harris pleaded to a lesser charge: assault 4 and immoral communication with a minor.

I must be missing something... yeah there was a one year delay in charging him but what brought his firing about 23 years later?

Gross. Not the main topic but I actually had no idea Deadliest Catch is even still on (I don’t really watch it often anyways).

Since I don't know who Josh Harris is, and don't give a shit about Deadliest Catch show, I want to thank you for putting a thread title about a truly horrific crime in the TV Talk forum.

Use the Report Post button and request a mod move it to a more appropriate area.

Why is it that the main link is broken and the two subsequent links have nothing to do with the main topic of the story?

I removed the crime from the title because I, and I’m sure others, would rather not have a url with “raping a 4 year old” in their history.

Good idea.

Never heard of Harris or the show.

I would not be surprised in the least if there were people that had been on the show, if not still on the show, that had done much worse in their past. So this was adjudicated back in 1999. Deadliest Catch didn't start airing until 2005, 6 years later.. And he is getting fired now?

He wasn't on the show to start and was only a "captain's son" for years after he joined. This year he got his own show about fishing in HI so there's more eyes. I highly doubt they did any background checks when one of the show's Captain's wanted to bring their son on the boat. Discovery just saw a good storyline to tape.

Seems like a stretch. I find it very hard to believe that Discovery didn't vet the people that were going to be on the show. Hell, they didn't vet the people that were going to be on the boat with their own people. Something like that would have come up in even the most rudimentary of background checks. I haven't watched in several years, but I remember the last few seasons I did watch, he was taking on a much bigger role on the main show. And it still didn't come up.

Well like you said, fishermen are a different breed. How many boats do you think Discovery would have ended up on if they did full background check on all the deckhands? The show never would have gotten off the ground.

Also, what can they do? A boat captain hires some greenhorn off the dock because they're desperate for a body and leaving port soon. Discovery doesn't get a chance to vet them before recording and editing. They probably don't have a chance to vet them at all in some cases.

We constantly hear about people getting on reality shows who end up having shady shit in their background but still pass the "background check". This doesn't surprise me at all.

I can understand him not being checked when he's a background player. But by the time you're ready to give him his own show I'd think they have to do a background check even if he's already working for them in another capacity.

Those are valid points. I guess I just think that Discovery would have done their due diligence on the people that were going to be featured on the show. Not only was he a deckhand for a number of seasons, he was also the son of one of the main captains on the show for years , and was/is himself a captain/owner.

During the HBO WB Discovery merger / global powerhouse / men/woman slides there was no talk (that I saw) of cash cow Deadliest Catch on Discovery. Guess we know why now. Someone knew something.