Jerry Harris, a former cheerleader who gained notoriety from the Netflix docuseries Cheer, has received a 12-year prison sentence for soliciting sex from minors and pressuring teenage boys into sending him lewd photos on the app Snapchat. His sentence will also be followed by eight years of court-supervised release.
Harris had become a fan favorite for his boisterous personality displayed on the show. He was even interviewed on Ellen in early 2020 and enjoyed an opportunity to be the show’s official Oscars correspondent that year.
In the fall of that same year, Harris was first arrested on a charge of production of child pornography. Prosecutors and the FBI said there was evidence of Harris soliciting inappropriate photos and videos from 14-year-old twin brothers, and he later confessed to asking for similar material from at least 10 others he knew to be minors.
One of Harris’ victims told reporters that Harris frequently sent him nudes and repeatedly asked him to send some back. He said Harris was constantly telling him over text messages “all of the things that he wants to, like, do to me, and stuff like that.” He also said Harris would threaten to block him if the victim wasn’t compliant enough.
Harris entered a guilty plea this year for receiving child pornography and crossing state lines to engage in illicit conduct to avoid prosecution on five other charges investigators had filed against him.
The sibling victims’ mother has sued Harris, the U.S. All-Star Federation which manages competitive cheer around the country, and private company Varsity Brands for being negligent towards Harris’ misconduct.
She claimed that an executive of USAF, VP of Membership Amy Clark, did not respond seriously to her multiple abuse reports, and only announced the suspension of Harris when his allegations first surfaced in a report.
