Author Amy Griffin has countersued a former classmate who filed suit against her earlier this year over Griffin’s memoir, The Tell, the Associated Press reports.
Griffin’s book, published last year by Dial Press, is her account of turning to MDMA-assisted therapy in order to recover memories of being sexually assaulted by a teacher when she was a middle school student in the late 1980s in Amarillo, Texas. A critic for Kirkus called the book “an important, wholly believable account of how long-buried but profoundly formative experiences finally emerge.”
A report in The New York Times last September questioned the accuracy of Griffin’s book, and this March, Griffin’s former classmate, identified as Jane Doe, sued Griffin alongside ghostwriter Sam Lansky and Dial Press, on claims of invasion of privacy and infliction of emotional distress. The classmate claims that the sexual abuse Griffin said she had suffered actually happened to Doe.
In her countersuit, Griffin accuses Doe of defamation. Griffin says that she wrote about her experiences in 2020 and, in 2021, detailed the alleged abuse in an interview with the Amarillo Police Department. Doe had claimed that she revealed her own experiences to a talent agent in 2022.
Tom Claire, Griffin’s attorney, told the AP, “Amy Griffin’s accuser has had every opportunity to set the record straight. This lawsuit’s purpose is to make the truth known. The New York Times knowingly promoted her false allegations and must also be held accountable.”
Doe told the AP in an email sent via her lawyers, “Despite trying to remain anonymous, Amy has now chosen to use her immense wealth and influence to try and silence me. She has had her lawyers identify me publicly as well as sue me. I am shocked and disappointed that she would choose to take this route, especially since she herself knows the truth.”
Michael Schaub is a contributing writer.
