\n\t\u201cWheel of Fortune\u201d announcer Jim Thornton has been fired from the game show, producer Sony Pictures TV confirmed. \u201cFollowing a thorough investigation, Jim Thornton\u2019s employment with\u00a0\u2018Wheel of Fortune\u2019\u00a0has been terminated, effective immediately,\u201d the studio said in a statement.<\/p>\n
\n\tAccording to insiders, Thornton won\u2019t be heard on the show when it returns for a new season on September 14, as an interim announcer has revoiced all of Thornton\u2019s parts on the shows. No permanent replacement has been announced.<\/p>\n
\n\tThornton\u2019s firing came just hours after TMZ posted photos <\/a>of what were allegedly him on an American Airlines plane with his laptop opened on \u201cdisturbing chat room\u201d that appeared to be \u201cimages and texts that made it appear it was a chat room for pedophiles.\u201d The up-close photos of the laptop\u2019s screen showed lewd conversations about minors.<\/p>\n \n\tThe alleged incident took place in May, when according to TMZ, a passenger informed a flight attendant about the chat screen on Thornton\u2019s laptop. Authorities were waiting to question Thornton when his flight landed at LAX, and after they spoke to the Thornton he was given permission to leave.<\/p>\n \n\tNeither Thornton nor his lawyer have publicly addressed the allegations; an attorney who said they represented the announcer, Allison Hart, told TMZ that Thornton had \u201cbecome active in suicide-prevention advocacy since losing a close family member to suicide two years ago and he has spent time visiting chat rooms offering support to individuals suffering from suicidal ideation.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tOn Tuesday, Sony Pictures TV said<\/a> that \u201cwe have recently been made aware of allegations concerning\u00a0Jim Thornton<\/a>. He has been suspended from \u2018Wheel of Fortune<\/a>\u2019 and we are recasting while we conduct a thorough investigation.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe announcer joined \u201cWheel\u201d in 2010 after the death of the show\u2019s previous announcer, Charlie O\u2019Donnell, and has also worked as a substitute announcer on \u201cThe Price Is Right.\u201d He\u2019s also been the voice of \u201cCelebrity Wheel of Fortune\u201d on ABC.<\/p>\n \n\tThornton\u2019s other credits include \u201cCelebrity Deathmatch,\u201d where he voiced Johnny Gomez, and as an announcer on \u201cThe Cleveland Show\u201d and \u201cTim & Eric Awesome Show, Great Job!\u201d He\u2019s also been heard on several video games and appeared as a commercial narrator in the 2001 animated film \u201cMonsters, Inc.\u201d He also voiced the 2011 Oscar-nominated short animated film \u201cLet\u2019s Pollute.\u201d<\/p>\n \n\tThornton has been a local media presence in Los Angeles for decades, having previously worked as an afternoon anchor on KNX 1070 Newsradio, which he first joined in 1985 as a traffic reporter with Metro Traffic. He also provided traffic reports on KCBS-TV.<\/p>\n \n\tHis other broadcast credits include Westwood One Radio Networks, and he was the voice of L.A.\u2019s KCOP-TV for four years. He has received an Edward R. Murrow award, Golden Mike awards and an Emmy.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cWheel of Fortune\u201d announcer Jim Thornton has been fired from the game show, producer Sony Pictures TV confirmed.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":836740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[88,354326,50073],"class_list":["post-836739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-jim-thornton","tag-wheel-of-fortune"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836739","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=836739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/836739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/836740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=836739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=836739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=836739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}