Jump to content
Pro Wrestling Only

The Benoit murders 6 months later


Bix

Recommended Posts

Guest KCook

God help me, but the idea of Chris Benoit trying to deny to his wife (who was smart to the business no less!) that he was on the juice is the funniest thing I've heard all day.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 83
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Top Posters In This Topic

http://muchnick.net/babylon/2008/04/03/exc...%80%99-tribute/

 

EXCLUSIVE: WWE Knew Chris Benoit Was the Perpetrator Before Staging ‘Monday Night Raw’ Tribute

 

by Irvin Muchnick

 

Back on June 25, 2007, Michael Benoit couldn’t have cared less about the exact timelines for the determination that his son, the famous pro wrestler Chris Benoit, had murdered his wife Nancy and their 7-year-old son Daniel before killing himself, all over the course of a weekend at their gated mansion outside Atlanta, Georgia. All the senior Benoit cared about was that he had lost a son, a daughter-in-law, and a grandson under the most gruesome and inexplicable circumstances imaginable. “My world,” he recalls, “was very black.”

 

These days Mike Benoit devotes himself to spreading the word about new research on the long-term effects of repeated brain concussions, which he believes is key to understanding Chris’s homicidal/suicidal rampage. It’s also yet another window on the lax health and safety standards of pro wrestling, which has endured a pandemic of premature deaths among its performers.

 

But now, in an exclusive interview, Benoit talks about how he and his wife Margaret got the awful news. Combined with newly released public records from Fayette County, Georgia, Benoit’s information answers one of the most controversial questions in the aftermath of the tragedy: What did World Wrestling Entertainment chairman Vince McMahon know and when did he know it? Is it true, as some WWE critics speculated early on, that McMahon staged a tribute to Chris Benoit on Monday Night Raw, hours after the bodies of the families were found, with full knowledge that Benoit was not a victim of the incident, but rather its perpetrator?

 

The answer is yes.

 

Mike Benoit says that Margaret answered the phone at around 3:30 p.m. Mountain time (5:30 Eastern) at their home near Sherwood Park, just outside Edmonton, Alberta. The caller was Carl DeMarco, president of WWE Canada. “I considered Chris one of my best friends …” DeMarco began.

 

“Why are you telling me this?” Margaret Benoit asked.

 

At that point DeMarco, realizing that the family had not yet been notified, said he would call her right back. DeMarco apparently proceeded to call Detective Bo Turner in Georgia, who had been assigned to inform both sides of the family, and Turner called Margaret Benoit. DeMarco also enlisted Scott Zerr, an Edmonton journalist who was close to Chris Benoit, to drive to Mike and Margaret’s and lend his support.

 

Mike Benoit was summoned home by Margaret. He pulled into the driveway around 4:45 p.m. Zerr greeted him there “and told me that Chris had taken the lives of Nancy and Daniel and then taken his own life,” Benoit says. “This information had been given to [Zerr] by WWE.”

 

Forty minutes earlier, in California, Dave Meltzer, publisher of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter, had received the same news in a call from Canada. Meltzer says the caller was a good friend of a WWE executive who had told him.

 

Constable Rob Morris of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police reported that he was dispatched to the Benoit home at 4:36 p.m. The constable assisted Emergency Medical Services in “a complaint of a distraught female [who] was just informed that her son, who lives in the United States, had passed away.” His report documents that he “called Detective TURNER to confirm details. Detective TURNER had already spoken with Chris’s Mother, Margaret BENOIT, and informed her of Chris’s passing. The incident was being investigated as an alleged murder-suicide.”

 

References to homicide-suicide also crop up early in crime-scene field reports.

 

At 8 p.m. Eastern time, a three-hour live special edition of WWE’s Raw began on the USA cable network. The show was originally planned to be built around the storyline death of Vince McMahon, the evil promoter “Mr. McMahon.” But three to four hours earlier, WWE decided to cancel that script, along with the live wrestling matches scheduled to be shown from the American Bank Center in Corpus Christi, Texas. Instead, McMahon appeared in an empty ring in an empty arena. “We at the WWE can only offer our condolences to the extended family of Chris Benoit,” McMahon said, voice choking, eyes blurred with tears. “The only other thing we can do at this moment is pay tribute to Chris Benoit.” With that, taped highlights of Benoit’s career, culminated by his winning the WWE world championship at WrestleMania in 2004, were played.

 

At the start of another WWE show the next night, on the Sci Fi network, McMahon said new facts had emerged and that, as a result, Benoit would not be mentioned again by WWE. All Benoit videos and merchandise were pulled from sale.

 

McMahon’s performance in Corpus Christi may have been designed to garner momentary sympathy for the company and distract the public from what WWE knew would be unprecedented scrutiny of its drug culture once the full facts came out. An additional factor in the equation may have been the historically high TV ratings for dead-wrestler tribute shows – Brian Pillman (1997), Owen Hart (1999), and Eddie Guerrero (2005).

 

WWE vice president for corporate communications Gary Davis did not respond directly to allegations of what the company might have known on June 25, 2007. In a news release the next day, WWE published a timeline and concluded: “In keeping with company policy, and with limited knowledge regarding facts of the case, WWE chose to air a memorial dedicated to the career of Chris Benoit. As facts emerged surrounding the case, all tributes to Chris Benoit were removed both on-air and on WWE.com.”

 

However, documents from the police investigation also expose serious contradictions in WWE’s timeline. In the early afternoon of Monday the 25th, WWE security chief Dennis Fagan called the Fayette County 911 Communications Center to ask for a “welfare check” on the missing wrestler. The 911 recording shows that Fagan represented that Benoit had left a mysterious message “to another wrestler” in the early hours of that morning, without specifying the medium. In fact, Benoit had sent a series of cryptic text messages to two other wrestlers, Scott James and Chavo Guerrero, more than 24 hours earlier. It is not clear if Fagan was simply mistaken or if the head of the company’s sophisticated security operation had not been properly briefed by higher-ups; and, if the latter, if that was part of a WWE public-relations strategy in the run-up to the Raw tribute show.

 

The WWE timeline accurately pegs to early Sunday morning the text messages to Benoit’s colleagues (whom the company does not name). Phone call logs compiled by the Fayette County sheriff show that Scott James texted back to Benoit at 9:26 a.m. Sunday, “When do u land?” – an apparent reference to a Sunday morning Atlanta-to-Houston flight that WWE executives had booked for Benoit, according to the company timeline.

 

(In a voicemail message and by other means, I solicited James’ comment on why he sent the “When do u land?” message. I also asked both James and Guerrero about the claim in the WWE timeline that company executives did not know about Benoit’s texts until 12:30 p.m. Monday. Neither wrestler responded.)

 

Mike Benoit says the family was grateful for the comfort and support provided by WWE Canada’s DeMarco. As for McMahon himself, Benoit says the chairman did not call until Friday, July 6 – 11 days later. Screening calls, Mike heard McMahon’s message live on the home answering machine. “I suppose that I could have called earlier,” McMahon said. “But we were both trying to deal with this.”

 

Benoit did not return McMahon’s call.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That Vince McMahon is a horrible human being who will happily pay tribute to a child murderer in order to protect his business and thus can't be trusted to run an honest drug testing policy?

 

We knew that before the Benoit stuff. Irv is building this up as a SHOCKING REVEAL~! and it's not even news for anyone who's paid attention at any point in the last 20+ years.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Irv Muchnick brings up his unanswered questions, proves he has lost his mind.

 

Specifically:

 

WWE’s head start?

The timeline of Benoit-related events published by WWE has more holes than Kimbo Slice’s ground game. The Raw tribute to Benoit on Monday night, June 25, was a work, though Vince kept the secret from most of the talent as well as from the viewing public (shocker!). From analysis of raw phone records – and no thanks to the sheriff’s report – we also can interpolate that the company knew the score at least two hours before calling 911. At this point there is no evidence that WWE did anything with their early knowledge other than get out in front of and shape the public story by “slowing down” the timeline and garnering early sympathy.

 

...

 

Who let the dogs out?

Early Sunday morning Benoit texted that the German shepherd guard dogs were in the fenced area surrounding the backyard pool. But when the sheriff’s deputies responded to the 911 call, the dogs were loose at the front gate. (See above, WWE’s head start.)

He seems to be implying that WWE sent someone to the house (who let the dogs out of the enclosed pool area in the process of investigating) before calling the cops. While I'm sure that WWE tried to pull as many strings as possible during the investigation, suggesting (without any evidence) that they tampered with a crime scene before contacting police is rather insane. The dog thing is curious (with Muchnick receiving conflicting reports about whether or not the dogs could have escaped on their own), but geez...
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'm convinced that Benoit, Chavo, and Dean destroyed Eddy's steroids and painkillers before letting anyone know he had died, and that's why Dave was surprised when he didn't follow the same code when he killed himself. But this is a really ridiculous accusation, and what would WWE have to gain from doing it?

 

Also, interpolate?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Weren't there painkillers in the room when the cops got there?

 

I agree Re: destroying steroids and HGH, though.

 

As far as Benoit and WWE sending fixers: I wouldn't put it past them to do it, but speculating that they did based on the available evidence is a bit much.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Also, interpolate?

I believe the word he was looking for was "extrapolate", although that doesn't really fit, either. "Infer" would probably be the correct word.

 

Either way, like most people who claim to be looking for "the truth", Irv only seems interested in looking for his version of it, which is unfortunate, since the real truth seems to be every bit as disgusting, and has the advantage of being....you know....true.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Who let the dogs out?

Early Sunday morning Benoit texted that the German shepherd guard dogs were in the fenced area surrounding the backyard pool. But when the sheriff’s deputies responded to the 911 call, the dogs were loose at the front gate. (See above, WWE’s head start.)

So... Mushnick believes that Benoit was of completely sound mind and must've been telling the truth about the dogs in his text message... in the middle of his homicidal rampage? If Benoit had texted someone at that point and said the sky was blue, they should've looked out the window to confirm it first.

 

And besides, the company only had a two-hour window, even by Irv's most generous calculations. Who the hell could they have gotten on that short notice to go to the house, clean stuff up, avoid the dogs, and leave zero evidence of their presence? Did they have Atlanta's equivalent of Marcellus Wallace and The Wolf on payroll?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Also, interpolate?

I don't know if folks do interpolation these days. I took some time off from college and when came back folks had graphing calculators and there were no tables in the back of books anymore. When I was doing math tutoring pretty clearly a subject dropped from curriculum. My guess is that its a dead (no longer taught) math skill at this point. It was used idiomatically to mean filling in gaps between knowns to get an approximate answer. Probably also dead as an idiom. But really feels like a better word choice than deduced.

 

But it's me, fuck if I know anything about proper word choice.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Also, interpolate?

I don't know if folks do interpolation these days. I took some time off from college and when came back folks had graphing calculators and there were no tables in the back of books anymore. When I was doing math tutoring pretty clearly a subject dropped from curriculum. My guess is that its a dead (no longer taught) math skill at this point. It was used idiomatically to mean filling in gaps between knowns to get an approximate answer. Probably also dead as an idiom. But really feels like a better word choice than deduced.

 

But it's me, fuck if I know anything about proper word choice.

 

I've forgotten 95% of the math I learned from middle school onwards. I know about extrapolation, so I kinda assume I learned about interpolation at some point, but I could very easily be wrong about that.

 

I've never heard anyone use "interpolate" as an idiom before, but I'm sure Irv is much older than I am, and it might have been more commonplace in his day. From my own frame of reference, I still think "infer" would be the correct word, but maybe "interpolate" works, too.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

http://www.cs.brown.edu/stc/outrea/greenho...on/itworks.html

 

Provides a real simple explanation. Whole page may be worth reading.

 

Linear Interpolation is a method that can be used for predicting. Very often something changes over a period of time: an object might change its position; a computer graphic image might change its shape; a population might increase. Linear interpolation allows you to predict an unknown value(position, shape, population, etc.) if you know any two particular values and assume that the rate of change is constant.

Linear interpolation assumes

 

 

1.that you know two particular values.

2. that the process is changing at a constant rate

3. that you desire to find an unknown data point

Pre Calculus texts and Stats texts used to have pages of log tables in the back. You didn't have fancy calculators. You couldn't calculate exact numbers and instead had to go to chart and use interpolation to figure out where answer fell between two known numbers in the table, estimating the answer based on where it fell between two known values. Slide rules used the same principle and you needed linear interpolation to be able to read them. It was necessary skill for any advanced level math.

 

We can actually now do things with mathematical precision pretty easily. You no longer need to predict unknown values. Everyone has a calculator and you can calculate exact values. And so those tables just aren't in your basic stats text. And no one is using a slide rule. I don't think you could buy a slide rule if you wanted to.

 

Interpolation may still be taught but it isn't as important (it was necessary for calculating answers off a slide rule or log table, neither of which are necessary tools) and I doubt taught in high school. I went to DC Public schools and my texts were at least a good ten years old to begin with, (I want to say that my stats book may have had a word problem dealing with the "colored" situation or something as absurd), and I fucking hope they got some new texts.

 

Not extrapolating, I want to say inductive and not deductive but yeah inferring may be the best word.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All this is distraction from basic Muchnik paranoia. Don't know if he's suggesting that Chavo actually showed up to clean up and just said fuck it or what he's suggesting but the who let the dogs out.

 

Suggesting that the WWE would tamper with a crime scene doesn't strike me as absurd as it strikes Bix. Implied in all of the stuff written about Benoit, is that disposing of the drugs is what wrestlers do after another wrestler dies. I mean my favorite wrestling is fucked up thing from the immediate aftermath, was the people in the biz who were shocked that Benoit wouldn't do his own clean up. " I can't believe he left the drugs out, what was he trying to say"... Really a guy kills his family and people are surprised that he didn't make sure to dispose of his drugs.

 

Still if Muchnik's suggesting that the WWE tried to tamper with evidence, they did a really incompetent job of evidence tampering.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Of course other wrestlers would've flushed the drugs. That's a hallowed old wrestling tradition going back at least as far as David Von Erich. The absurdity here is that there was simply no time for them to do anything like that. Irv himself says there was only a two-hour window. All the wrestlers and other employees were at the arena for the big cross-brand Raw that night. Do they have some of those 80s Action Movie Thugs on the payroll who are willing to committ major crime and risk lengthy jail time just because the boss says so? And even if they did, said thugs would've had to have been in Atlanta already that day.

 

EDIT: and no, they don't teach much interpolation these days. Even when I was in high-school geometry about a dozen years ago, they already more or less required you to have a graphing calculator. The slide rule is dead, long live the slide rule.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Well, it's one year after the fact. Just some questions to toss out for everyone to think about.... I'll add my answers/observations later.

 

1. What seems to be the pro wrestling industry's attitude toward steroid usage now?

 

2. What is the industry's attitude toward the usage of painkillers?

 

3. What is the industry doing in regards to making sure matches are as safe as possible?

 

4. What is the propensity of wrestlers to try to work/perform when hurt?

 

5. Should the fact that no wrestler has "died young" so far this year (at least, the ones I know who have died were at least in their 60s) be considered a good sign?

 

6. What more can be done to ensure pro wrestling continues to address steroid usage, painkiller usage, preventing concussions, ensuring workers stay healthy, etc.?

 

If anyone has other questions they think should be considered, feel free to share.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well, it's one year after the fact. Just some questions to toss out for everyone to think about.... I'll add my answers/observations later.

 

1. What seems to be the pro wrestling industry's attitude toward steroid usage now?

 

2. What is the industry's attitude toward the usage of painkillers?

 

3. What is the industry doing in regards to making sure matches are as safe as possible?

 

4. What is the propensity of wrestlers to try to work/perform when hurt?

 

5. Should the fact that no wrestler has "died young" so far this year (at least, the ones I know who have died were at least in their 60s) be considered a good sign?

 

6. What more can be done to ensure pro wrestling continues to address steroid usage, painkiller usage, preventing concussions, ensuring workers stay healthy, etc.?

 

If anyone has other questions they think should be considered, feel free to share.

1) The attitude is the same as it's always been. "Hey, steroids are bad, yeah they can kill you...but you have to sell tickets/it's their personal choice/WELL SMOKING CAN KILL YOU TOO DO YOU WANT TO BAN THAT HEALTH NAZI/Name one wrestler who you can prove died from steroids? Eddie Guerrero? Nah, you're lying/You're not in the locker room, you can't criticize us/Oh come on, nobody does that anymore. That was only in the 80s and in Ted Turner's WCW", etc.

 

2) "Do as many as you want, just don't show up a taping fucked up or we'll have to fire you."

 

3) Not much.

 

4) Too much.

 

5) Of course it's a good sign, but as always the wrestling business is a ticking time bomb waiting for another of its periodical small explosions. Given that nothing has really changed within the thought processes or behavior of those in the industry I don't think it's a sign that improvements have been made, just that certain people within wrestling who have used or do use drugs are lucky not to have had a heart attack.

 

6) Not pushing guys based on size, reducing the schedule, not fostering the attitude that working while injured means you're a tough guy. Of course, that's antithetical to the way WWE has promoted over the last 25 years, and as Vince goes, so goes the industry, so I don't see any of those necessary changes coming.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The newest WON has on the record comments from Sandra Toffolini, Nancy's sister.

 

Of note:

 

- Her family believes the drugs were a bigger factor than the brain damage in Chris going insane.

- Daniel was a year behind in school because Chris was paranoid about him getting harmed after a threatened kidnapping of a name wrestler friend's child and the murder of Iron Sheik's daughter. They eventually settled on a private school that he trusted. Daniel seemed to be of above average intelligence, was talkative around people he knew, and was only shy around strangers. No Fragile X.

- The Toffolinis were "heartbroken" over the Hustler photos, but Sandra noted that Nancy was an adult and lived her life.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.


×
×
  • Create New...