OSU professor interviewed in Abercrombie documentary on former CEO's indictment

COLUMBUS, Ohio (WCMH) - Former Abercrombie and Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries was indicted on 16 federal charges Tuesday including sex trafficking and prostitution.  

The longtime CEO of the central Ohio-based company worked for the company from 1992 to 2014. Jeffries was hired by Les Wexner in 1992 to head the Abercrombie & Fitch brand Wexner purchased four years prior. 

Ohio State University professor Dr. Treva Lindsey was interviewed by Netflix for “White Hot: The Rise & Fall of Abercrombie and Fitch,” a documentary that debuted in 2022. Much of the documentary shed light on allegations of racism, discrimination, and sexual exploitation of employees. 

"What is more provocative in our pop culture landscape than sex? But what was interesting about this one, compared to other brands that had gone more sexualized, more explicitly sexual, was the sexualization of men and boys," Lindsey said on Tuesday after hearing about the indictment. 

Jeffries was indicted alongside his longtime suspected partner Mike Smith and one other man accused of recruiting young men for "sex events." 

"I know that there's an indictment here that's for these individuals, but these statements are an indictment of who we were in that moment, too," Lindsey said. 

The alleged crimes happened from 2008 to 2015. Lindsey said that our current culture looks at sexual exploitation differently than previous generations, even since the mid-2000s. 

"There is this kind of turning point in our culture where I think we're looking back differently and looking at these transgressions, looking at these, the harm that was caused, I think in particular, now even getting to a point in society where we look at the harm that boys encounter in terms of sexual violence,” she said. “We still tend to think of sexual violence and sexual predation and trafficking as something that primarily affects girls and women, which is not untrue, but it absolutely impacts boys and men as well.”  

Jeffries is accused of using his position as CEO of one of the most popular and lucrative fashion brands to benefit his own sexual desires. Oftentimes, these stories and headlines seem far away from central Ohio, but this one lived right here in New Albany. 

"I remember when I first moved here about 11 years ago, realizing at that time Columbus was like the third biggest city for fashion merchandizing in the country, which puts it in a very different context, a conversation in this industry, and a lot of that is, of course, due to Les Wexner’s impact here in the city,” Lindsey said. “And so that also means all of the things we hear about the industry, which people tend to think of almost exclusively as L.A., New York, are happening here in Columbus." 

The culture of sexual exploitation has swung. The #MeToo viral movement in 2017 has since led to numerous high-profile arrests and convictions of powerful, wealthy men involved in sex crimes like Jeffrey Epstein, R. Kelly, and Harvey Weinstein, and the recent arrest of Sean 'Diddy' Combs. 

"We knew that sexual favors were being traded in this industry, but we map that as sexual favors and someone consenting when now I think we would look at consent very differently and think about how power played out in that dynamic,” Lindsey said. “How do you really have a choice -- choice in the way that we think about choice -- if someone's dangling your career in your hand?”