ABC News has resolved a legal fight with former Good Morning America producer Kirstyn Crawford, who had accused the network’s news division of turning a blind eye to allegations of misconduct and harassment by Michael Corn, a former senior news executive. ABC filed a stipulation of dismissal with prejudice on Friday in New York state court of Crawford’s suit against ABC News and Corn, a former GMA executive producer, who Crawford accused of improper sexual contact during a 2015 business trip to Los Angeles. Crawford’s team also signed the filing. The lawsuit has been dismissed for both ABC News and Corn.
It appears Michael Corn and ABC News are not out of the woods just yet. Portions of an August 2021 sexual harassment lawsuit filed by former Good Morning America producer Kirstyn Crawford against the former executive in charge of GMA that were dismissed by a New York judge last June were reinstated by a New York appellate court Tuesday morning.
A judge in New York State Supreme Court dismissed a lawsuit against former ABC News producer Michael Corn, who was alleged to have sexually assaulted a subordinate and to have created a toxic work environment at ABC News.
A lawsuit claims executives knew of misconduct at the key revenue generator Good Morning America but didn’t follow up and discouraged an official report.
Both ABC and the former top producer of its Good Morning America have asked that a sexual-assault lawsuit filed against both of them be dismissed, citing New York’s statute of limitations on harassment claims and alleging the plaintiff in some parts has made charges that are inapplicable.
Exclusives
ABC News President Kim Godwin told staffers on a conference call Thursday that she has requested an independent investigation into how the network handled allegations of sexual assault against the former executive producer of Good Morning America. The comments came a day after a lawsuit was filed that alleged the producer, Michael Corn, sexually assaulted a current ABC News staffer and a former staffer in separate incidents.
An ABC News staffer filed a lawsuit Wednesday against Michael Corn, the former top producer of Good Morning America, alleging he sexually assaulted her and fostered a toxic work environment. Kirstyn Crawford, a producer on the morning show, alleged that Corn assaulted her in 2015 during a business trip to Los Angeles, according to the suit, which was filed in New York state court.
Nexstar taps the award-winning former ABC News senior executive producer of Good Morning America and ABC World News for a new executive position at its nascent cable news network.
Michael Corn will join the struggling cable news network ahead of the launch of a new morning program.
The new president of ABC News won’t start until May, but she already has a critical assignment: The top producer of ABC’s Good Morning America is leaving the show. Michael Corn, an ABC News veteran who worked alongside Diane Sawyer at World News Tonight and who has managed GMA since 2014, has left the company abruptly.
Tom Cibrowski will become a top deputy to news division President James Goldston, while Michael Corn will replace Cibrowski as senior executive producer at Good Morning America and Almin Karamehmedovic will become that show’s top producer.
Jon Banner, who managed ABC’s nightly newscast World News through nearly a decade of turbulence and through four periods of anchors, is moving off the program and into a special projects position at the news division. Banner, the longest-serving of any of the evening news executive producers, is being succeeded by Michael Corn, a longtime producer of ABC’s Good Morning America.
