John Dean’s Wife, Maureen Dean: 5 Fast Facts You Need to Know

John Dean was the first witness for the House Judiciary Committee’s Mueller report hearing on Monday, June 10, 2019. This hearing was called: “Lessons from the Mueller Report: Presidential Obstruction and Other Crimes.” Dean was counsel for Richard Nixon when he was President, was later disbarred and had to serve time in prison. John Dean has been married to his wife, Maureen Dean, since 1972. Maureen Dean is brought up during The Irishman, when there is a scene with her and Al Pacino. Learn more about Maureen below.

1. Maureen Was Nationally Recognized when She Sat Stoically with John Dean During the Watergate Hearings

Maureen “Mo” Dean is known for sitting stoically just behind her husband during the Watergate hearings, People shared. John Dean was later disbarred, but she stayed calm during the hearings. Her presence got national attention at the time.

2. Maureen Dean Has Written Screenplays & a 1987 Novel Called ‘Washington Wives’

Maureen Dean wrote a steamy novel in the 1980s that got national attention and a number of screenplays. Her best known written work is “Washington Lives,” which was covered by People in 1987. The book – her first novel – was set in 1989 and described as a “steamy literary debut with a tale of passion on the Potomac.” The book has “expletives that Mo didn’t delete” and also has subplots involving hereditary madness, alcoholism, and drugs. She said the characters aren’t based on real people, but are composites of people she knew.

Maureen didn’t come up with the plot. Lawrence Gordon, a movie producer, came up with the idea as a possible miniseries and Arbor House suggested Maureen Dean. The book took her two-and-a-half years to finish.

The novel was dedicated in memory of her parents.

She’s also written screenplays called Blind Ambition (1979) and The Mike Douglas Show (1961) according to IMDB.

In 1975 she released a book called: “Mo: A Woman’s View of Watergate.”

That book sold more than 30,000 hardcover copies and helped her and John pay off some of their debts with the $80,000 advance she split with Hays Gorey, People wrote in 1976. John Dean wrote his own book for which he received a $300,000 advance.

3. Colleagues Described John as ‘Completely in Love’ with Maureen

H.R. Haldeman, Nixon’s chief of staff, said in 1973 that it was likely John Dean’s healthy sex life with his wife kept him sane during while working for Nixon, U.S. News & World Report shared. “He’s completely in love with her, makes no bones about it,” Haldeman said.

Maureen told People that the stress of Watergate strengthened their marriage. “If he’s upset about something, he’ll sit down and talk to me about it. I don’t even have to say anything—like a psychiatrist. In discussing things he finds an answer.”

In 1973, Maureen locked herself in a bathroom and threatened to cut her wrists. Maureen told People in 1974 that she just wanted attention and was trying to scare John. “It gave me the reassurance I needed at the moment, but I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone.”

4. Maureen Worked in Finance & Was Married Twice Before Meeting John Dean

According to People, Maureen Dean had dropped out of college after her dad died and worked as a secretary and a flight attendant. She was married twice before she and John Dean were introduced by a friend. (In one of her marriages, her high school sweetheart died in a car accident two years after they were married. The other was never official because she found out after the brief marriage that the football scout hadn’t divorced his first wife.)

John was called in to help with the Watergate scandal two days after they were married, People shared. They moved to Beverly Hills after he served four-and-a-half months in prison. She managed the family finances and realized she really enjoyed that work. So she entered a training program in finances, where she eventually started her own stockbrokerage business and had hundreds of clients.

After his prison term, John worked as an investment banker, Maureen told the South Florida Sun Sentinel in 1988. “I just retired from a stockbrokerage so we have plenty of time to take long walks together, go on bike rides, watch videos…”

5. John Dean Has a Son from a Previous Marriage

John Dean has only one child, John Wesley Dean IV. John IV was born to John and his first wife, Karla Ann Hennings. Karla later married Larry E. Phillips, a senior partner with Buchanon Ingersoll at the time of her son’s engagement announcement in 1990.

In 1990, John Wesley married Dorothy Rooms Fox, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas H. Fox of Connecticut, The New York Times reported. Dorothy’s father was senior vice president for JP Morgan & Company when she was married, and her mother was manager of Kropotkin INc.

John Wesley Dean IV graduated from Denison University, where he was with Phi Beta Kappa, and later received an MBA, according to his engagement announcement.

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