GOP Utah House Majority Leader Resigns In Wake Of Teen Hot-Tubbing Scandal

Utah House Majority Leader Kevin Garn (R) has resigned. The decision comes two days after his admission that he’d paid $150,000 to a woman in return for her silence that they’d partied nude in a hot tub when the woman was only 15 years old.

While GOP leaders scramble to find a replacement for Garn, new accusations surfaced Saturday from Cheryl Maher, the woman involved in the 1985 incident, who was an employee at a Layton record store owned by Garn at the time. Maher, who signed a non-disclosure agreement when she accepted the payment from Garn, said she was disappointed in news coverage that she felt made it appear as if she were a “gold digger.” She said she wanted the truth to come out, and that truth is that she wasn’t the only female employee with whom Garn had contact. “There were other girls,” Maher said. “After me, it was Liz … Liz Moody now. She used to be Liz Smuin.” While Maher did not provide details on the nature of that contact, she said she knew there was “some kind of relationship going on” between then-Smuin and Garn after the woman moved from Garn’s Pegasus Records store in Bountiful to the Layton location, where Maher also worked.