Former Survivor Contestant Arrested For Child Pornography Possession

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By Corey Chichizola
published

Well, it looks like one of reality TV’s most infamous personalities might be facing some serious jail time. Mike Skupin, who was a two-time contestant from CBS’s groundbreaking reality competition show Survivor was recently arrested at his hometown in Michigan.

Fox 2 Detroit is reporting that Mike Skupin was arrested for a variety of charges which includes possession of child pornography. The arrest was originally made because of a ponzi scheme that Skupin was allegedly running through an organization called Pay It Forward. Attorney General Bill Schuette made a statement about the scheme saying:

Victims allegedly made $10,000 cash investments in the scheme. Their money would then cycle through a chart in which participants were eventually paid out of other new investors’ money. The scheme was discovered when eventually there were no new investors signing and most people in the scheme lost all of their money.

During the ponzi investigation, Mike Skupin’s laptop was searched and the investigators discovered images of underage children engaging in sexual situations. After the discovery of the illegal imagery, Skupin was arraigned on six counts of possession of child sexual abusive materials, five counts of larceny by conversion, and one count of racketeering, conducting a criminal enterprise.

Mike Skupin first gained public notoriety in the second season of Survivor, entitled Survivor: Australia. While physically dominating the competition and becoming a frontrunner, he had an unfortunate accident that made TV history. As Skupin was kindling the camp fire, he inhaled smoke and fell hands first into the flames. This tragic accident, captured on television, was an eye-opener as to exactly how real the reality competition was. Additionally, he was the first person to ever be medically evacuated from the competition on day 17.

12 years later, Mike Skupin would return for Season 25 Survivor: Philippines. In his second attempt, he was once again physically injured a handful of times, but was able to make it much further than his first game. In fact, Skupin managed to successfully maneuver himself around the other players, and get to the finale episode on Day 39. While he was unable to win $1 million and the title of soul survivor, he made it to second place.

This isn’t the first time a former Survivor contestant has been arrested. The winner of Season 1, Richard Hatch, was convicted of attempting to evade taxes in 2006, as well as another stint for violating his parole in 2011. Additionally, Survivor: One World contestant Kat Endorsson was arrested in 2010 for shoplifting.

Check out one of Mike Skupin’s most infamous Survivor moments: where he butchered a pig so the tribe could eat.

Corey Chichizola
Corey Chichizola
Movies Editor

Corey was born and raised in New Jersey. Graduated with degrees theater and literature from Ramapo College of New Jersey. After working in administrative theater for a year in New York, he started as the Weekend Editor at CinemaBlend. He's since been able to work himself up to reviews, phoners, and press junkets-- and is now able to appear on camera with some of his favorite actors... just not as he would have predicted as a kid. He's particularly proud of covering horror franchises like Scream and Halloween, as well as movie musicals like West Side Story. Favorite interviews include Steven Spielberg, Spike Lee, Jamie Lee Curtis, and more.