Law&Crime Sidebar - WWE Wrestler Accused Company of Horrific Misconduct Before Her Death
Episode Date: February 19, 2024Ashley Massaro was featured on WWE programming from 2005 to 2008. In a sworn affidavit, Massaro claimed the company misled her about her role, didn’t give her any training before performing... complex wrestling moves, and didn’t provide proper medical care to deal with her extensive injuries. The affidavit also claims that Massaro was raped while on a WWE tour in Kuwait and WWE executives covered it up. Law&Crime’s Jesse Weber analyzes the accusations with sex crimes prosecutor Anne Bremner and wrestling expert Tom Campbell from Cultaholic Wrestling.PLEASE SUPPORT THE SHOW: If you’ve suffered an injury and need legal support click www.attorneytom.com/Sidebar for a FREE consultation or dial 855-TOM-WINS.HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergVideo Editing - Michael DeiningerScript Writing & Producing - Savannah WilliamsonGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. She said a gentleman in a white coat that appeared to be
a doctor, but she didn't believe he actually was a doctor. Walked over to her and he administered
some more medication and the next thing she remembered after that was waking up in that small
closet-sized room. A former wrestler with the in-battle WWE apparently left behind a sworn affidavit
prior to her death in which she said she was raped, WWE covered it up, and that she was
punished by Vince McMahon after she turned down his sexual advances. We're breaking down her
allegations and whether they could still be used against company titans like Vince McMahon with
sex crimes prosecutor Anne Bremner and wrestling expert Tom Campbell from cultaholic wrestling.
Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Long Crime, Jesse Weber.
Right now, World Wrestling Entertainment is under an intense amount of scrutiny.
The company's founder, Vince McMahon, resigned after a lawsuit from a former employee,
Janelle Grant, accused him of rape and sex trafficking.
And with that, a new conversation has started about the ceased W.E.
W.W.E. wrestler Ashley Massaro.
Now, in 2016,
Masaro joined a class action lawsuit against the WWE,
alleging the company concealed the risks of injuries
from concussions and other head injuries
that cause all this kinds of neurological damage.
But she also had alleged in that paperwork
that she was sexually assaulted by a man
posing as a doctor on a WWE tour
at a military base in Kuwait.
Now, she wrote that she was given an IV
at this military tent
that was supposed to be for dehydration, but a man told her that he was, who said he was a doctor,
allegedly injected a drug into the IV line that kept Massaro from moving or screaming.
She has called this a living nightmare.
Now, she claims that the WWE apologized but told her not to report the assault
because it allegedly might have had a detrimental effect with WW's relationship with the United States military.
Now, in fact, Massaro's best friend, Kara Pippia, told Ashley Banfield on News Nation that both Vince McMahon and Stephanie McMahon, his daughter, were in the meeting where they told Massaro to keep things under wraps.
She spent about eight hours with her head on my lap, in tears, telling me what happened to her in Kuwait and just letting it all out.
And now, in a previously unpublished statement from prior to her death,
obtained by Vice News, Masaro claimed that Vince McMahon prayed on female wrestlers,
even making out with them.
And when she allegedly denied his sexual advances towards her,
she claimed she was punished, namely that he wrote Vince McMahon,
WW's storylines that would demean her.
In the end, the sworn affidavit was left out of that lawsuit
because the focus of the suit was on head injuries and the lawsuit was ultimately dismissed.
The appeals were denied.
As for Ashley Massaro, she tragically died in New York in May of 2019.
She reportedly didn't show up for work, was found unresponsive at her home.
And while the medical examiner's office didn't release an official cause of death, it has been long reported as a suicide.
To talk more about this, let me bring on right now trial attorney and former sex crimes prosecutor Anne Bremner and also wrestling expert Tom Campbell.
who is a presenter for cultaholic wrestling.
Great to have you both here.
Tom, let me start with you.
What do we know about Ashley Massaro,
who she was, her character,
and her role in the WWE?
Well, she was born and raised in New York.
She was a former model.
She earned a WWE contract
through a reality show-type game show
called the WWE Diva Search,
designed to find new female talent.
She won $250,000 and a one-year contract with WWE.
She would end up staying longer than that year.
Like most WWE stars, her character was an extension of herself,
very much a rocker at heart, and it came through in what she did.
She was a, she was a WWE star, though, at a time when wrestling was presented very differently,
if you were a female performer, matches more designed around appeasing,
the male audience as opposed to putting on competitive matches that men were.
So we never truly got to see what Ashley would be capable of.
During her time with the company from 2005 to 2008, as you say, there were certain
storylines that felt like they were designed to bring her down and numerous accounts of
those over the years.
Until 2008, when she asked for her release from the company, her daughter got sick.
She needed the time to go home and be with her.
And it was around 2019, just before her very untimely passing,
that there was talk of her making a comeback into wrestling.
Not only was she keen to get back into the wrestling world,
but she was also keen to talk more about what had allegedly occurred on the tour in Q8 as well.
Okay, so, Anne, let me ask you the big picture here, right?
So we now know there are these kind of this new development from the Ashley Massaro statement,
but we're also learning, or it's brought back into the spotlight,
her allegations that were part of this lawsuit that was filed.
Sitting here today, what do you think is the big legal impact of this moving forward?
Well, it's interesting, and by the way, thanks for having me on.
And especially with the renowned wrestling experts,
something I really don't know that much about what I do about the law, not for wrestling.
But I think it remains to be seen because the fact that you're dealing with something
that was part of another case, as I understand.
understand it, but it was a different case. And so then the question is now, you know, for what
use, for what could it be used and what's the impact? Obviously, there's an avalanche of
allegations, you know, and going far back with a lot of money that's been expended to settle a lot
of cases. But this will be interesting in terms of where it leads and the admissibility of
the statement. Well, talking about and the statement made that that hasn't been published that was
part of this lawsuit, this idea that Ashley Massaro says that Vince McMahon would, you know,
target other women, make out with them that he, she denied his own sexual advantages and was
punished as a result, given these bad storylines and demeaned her. It was eerily reminiscent
of what we heard in the Janelle Grant lawsuit. Radically different. Janelle Grant, I mean,
really alleged some heinous and disgusting things that we did a whole, a few shows on it.
And to be clear, Ashina Masaro is not alleging the same thing, but the commentary is very similar.
And I wonder, could representatives of her estate somehow join that lawsuit, that Janelle Grant lawsuit?
Yes.
I mean, the answer is yes.
I mean, you can always join a lawsuit with the questions whether, as you know, Jesse, it survives, you know, summary judgment or any kind of legal attack.
You know, one of the things in terms of a claim suicide, I mean, I want to talk about
out in a minute, but, you know, in terms of damages in her estate, it gets a little bit
complicated.
The fact that there's a pattern in a way, and we've just learned this information, sure,
her estate could go ahead and join in the litigation.
My understanding, the reason her name is coming up again right now, after the Vince McMahon
allegations, walk us through what we knew before today about her claims about being sexually
assaulted and bringing that to the management of the WWE and then we'll get into this statement
about Vince McMahon and what he allegedly did to her.
So these claims came out during a famous class action lawsuit that was brought to the
WWE featuring 50 former wrestlers about the lack of knowledge of head injury in wrestling.
And it was in this case that we would hear these allegations from Ashton.
Masaro, this story would come out in an affidavit, Ashti Mazaro claims,
whilst on a WWE tour in the Middle East, she was taken sick.
And she was seen by what she believed to be a U.S. Army doctor.
She was given an IV that she didn't know the contents of.
She was taken into a section away from other people in the hospital.
And it's there that it is claimed that she was assaulted by this person.
claimed to be a U.S. Army doctor, the drug that she had, paralyzing her body and leaving her
unable to retaliate or fend her off in any way her attacker. The more heartbreaking to this
was that according to these allegations, there was a female officer that was outside the room
by keeping lookout. It wasn't, it was only when WWE agent Gary Hart turned up that the assault
that allegedly took place, stopped from there. Gary Hart drove Ashley Massaro back to her hotel room
where she was left until she was in a state to continue the tour. She only told a few people
what actually went on. She confided in a colleague in Maria Canellis. She told Gary Hart about it
and a few others, but wanted to keep it to herself. It came to the end of the tour and her
airline tickets had mysteriously disappeared.
So she was in a situation where she couldn't leave the country.
And WW agents who were on the tour couldn't get hold of WWE management back in the States
to sort her out a new ticket.
So they left without her,
which when you consider what has been reported to have happened,
is absolutely without reprehension of left her there.
Now, Ashley Masaro does say in this affidavit that she has a friend who is a travel agent
who was able to get her connected with somebody from the airline working in the airport
she was at and she was able to arrange her own travel back to the States.
When she got back to the States, she spoke to WWE's physician who convinced her to talk
to higher-ups about what happened.
She was even, as we've discovered recently, consoled by Vince McMahon's daughter,
then a higher-up in the WWE, Stephanie McMahon,
and was convinced to speak to Vince McMahon,
John Laurenitis and the WWE board about what took place.
And when she did, she recounted what she claimed happened to her on the tour.
Vince McMahon alleged to have apologized for what happened,
said she will no longer go on any tours of the Middle East,
says that going forward all female performers will have.
have a we'll have somebody to to travel with we'll have a 24-7 a female escort to be with however
and this is the bit that has really got conversations going it's initially in the report it is said
that she in the initial affidavit it said that she is asked not to talk about it reports have since
said that she allegedly was threatened to not talk about it the line from the affidavit that came
from the lawsuit from several years back,
Ashley Massaro was told by Vince McMahon
not to let one bad experience ruin the good work they are doing
with the US military.
It was concerned by Vince McMahon,
there would be a blowback should this go any further.
So he said, don't say anything because we have a good relationship with them.
And as we know, nothing was said.
Well, here's the part that I thought is so interesting.
At the time of this 2017 affidavit, the WWWE had released a statement saying at no time was Vince McMahon or the management of WWE ever informed by Ashley Massaro or anybody else that she'd been sexually assaulted, drug, raped, or sodomized by a military doctor with a nurse standing guard while on a goodwill tour in 2007 to U.S. military bases in Kuwait.
In fact, if she ever articulated such a claim to WWE, we would have reported it immediately to the base commander.
That is not true, according to Massaro, and also according, if I'm reading it correctly, John Lorenitis's camp.
So he, John Laurenitis, is being sued by Janelle Grant, and he has said that, from his lawyers have said that, no, wait a minute, WWE Upper Management knew about this, right?
Yeah, so this is what's come out in the last few weeks as a result of the Janelle Grant allegations, John Laurenitis, who is named in the Janelle Grant case as,
a defendant is claiming that he was also a victim of Vince McMahon and he has said in a recent
statement that of upper management did know what took place at that military base and this completely
flies in the face of a statement that WWE put out in 2019 in which they say they were completely
unaware of what had transpired in Kuwait a massive contradiction completely at a really critical
time in this Janelle Grant case that could add some leverage to what we're hearing, the
latest statements from the Ashley Mazzaro case.
And let me turn it to you.
What do you think about these allegations that came, you know, years ago that Ashley Mazzar comes
forward.
She tells the W.W.E management that she had been sexually assaulted while Arnese tour and that
they basically told her to remain quiet.
And that Stephanie McMahon, one of the higher ups there, had also done this.
You know, there was an allegation from her friend, Mizarro's friend.
It's Stephanie McMahon first made her comfortable.
And then once she's in this room, Massaro basically is told to be quiet and to cover this up.
I mean, you've dealt with these kinds of cases before these kinds of allegations.
And as I mentioned with Tom, it's a situation where the WWE first came out in 2017 and said,
Massaro never told upper management.
That looks like that's not true.
What's your take on it?
Well, it's just huge in terms of liability and the fact that they're trying to cover it up.
I mean, when I look at all of the money that went out in these settlements,
it reminded me of Michael Jackson when he kept settling cases back to 1993.
I think one was $26 million with Jordy Chandler,
and it was when he ran out of money that he actually had a criminal case.
So I also wondered about criminal implications in case like this
because it's just so longstanding and the cover-ups are clear.
And the fact is they want things to remain quiet because then your expert will say the money
in the wrestling, I had no idea how much money there was in all of this.
I mean, it's a cash cow.
Talking lawsuits like this, let me just take a minute to thank attorney Tom and associates for sponsoring this episode of Sidebar.
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And if that happens, the last thing you want to be thinking about is rushing around trying to get a lawyer.
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So this newly released statement that was obtained by vice, it was never published, it wasn't made part of the lawsuit.
You, before we get started, you haven't seen this before until it broke in the past couple of weeks, right?
About these allegations.
Yeah, the first time that we'd seen this was when it broke by vice, yeah.
So in other words, this allegations, again, from Massaro about Vince McMahon that he had been praying on women, making out with them, that he tried to proposition her and that he punished her as a result, right?
this is all new to us this is all new to us what we're hearing here we and the the statement says
that this started happening just after ashley masaro had posed for playboy previously ashie mazara
says in this statement and unreleased until vice shared it was that it was commonplace to see
vince mcmann to quote the statement making out with other wwee divas he had never shown any
interest to her until she posed for Playboy. She talks about one particular incident in which
Vince McMahon claims to, it's claimed that constantly rang her phone, her mobile phone and her
hotel room phone overnight to try and get her to come up to his room. Ashley said she wasn't
feeling well eventually and said that he would see her at work tomorrow and she says that from there
everything seems to change in this statement. Ashley Bizarra says the following
day. Vince McMahon is not only making lewd comments towards her as she walks past,
but also is now writing her segments for her. This is quite an interesting development in this
story. Now, it's not uncommon for Vince McMahon to write segments in wrestling. I think when
you and I spoke previously about the Janelle Grant case, it is common for Vince McMahon to
write himself into storylines that sees him as a very dominant figure, as an eager, maniacal
leader and as somebody that always finds himself in some sort of romantic liaison with female
talents. So for Vince McMahon to suddenly take such great interest in writing Ashley Mazzaro's
segments was an interesting development. And there is, in terms of, like, what it is said is that
there's an incident involving Michael Hayes. And Michael Hayes is a senior producer for WWE.
and Michael Hayes sees this segment that was written for Ashley Mizarro initially act shocked
as if to go, who wrote this for you?
And when it's revealed that it was Vince McMahon, he kind of steps back and goes,
ah, well, them's the brakes.
That's the word from the statement.
Them's the brakes.
In terms of what these segments would have looked like, there is one that springs to mind
in which Vince McMahon is backstage with a cup of coffee and Ashley Mazzaro runs past him.
In doing so, she knocks the coffee into.
him. And what proceeds is a really uncomfortable two-minute segment in which Vince
McMahon just verbally runs down Ashton Mazzaro gets in her face, gaslights her, and eventually
tells her that she is suspended indefinitely from the company. And Ashti Mazzaro is crying
at this point. He's mocking the fact that she's sobbing on TV. Eventually, he walks away,
throwing the coffee at her. Now, this was all written for television. This was
Mr. McMahon the character and Ashley Mazzaro the character.
When you read the statement that has been put out and then you see that promo or you see that
segment and you know what's allegedly happened between the two, it makes for unbelievably
uncomfortable viewing more so than it did before.
I haven't seen it personally, your description made me uncomfortable just thinking about it.
You know, by the way, talking about this, my understanding is TKO, which is now,
the parent company, it owns
WWE, the spokesperson
came out, hasn't provided
a comment about these allegations
from the Ashley Massaro statement,
but they did confirm
that the man you mentioned, Michael Hayes,
still works for the
WWE, right?
He does. Michael Hayes is still
a pivotal part of WWE.
He's a senior producer there.
In fact, one of the biggest stars
in the company currently is
the WWE Universal Champion Roman Reigns. Michael Hayes writes a lot of, if not all of, the segments
that feature Roman Reigns. So as very much as Roman Reigns is an important character on
screen, Michael Hayes behind the scenes is the one that is controlling how these segments go down.
So not only, yes, he is still very much part of WWE, but he's a really important cog in that
machine and this this statement and these allegations if they ring true speaks a lot to the character
of michael hayes if they ring true there have been many wwe stars that have worked with
michael hayes and spoken very highly of him but to with with this scene here his role in these
allegations almost like they're really damning because it suggests that michael hayes not
knows exactly what is going on, i.e. Vince McMahon is looking to drag somebody's career down
because he didn't get his way, and he is implicit in it, which is incredibly damning to
potentially the reputation of Michael Hayes. So, Anne, you heard me talk about with Tom about
Michael Hayes, one of these currently, I mean, the TKO group holdings, said that Michael Hayes
currently works for the WWE, still there. Again, alleged by Massaro as somebody who knew about
what had happened to her, told her those are the breaks.
Do you think, and I talked about this with Tom on a past episode, do you think TKO Group
Holdings is going to be in a process to go through the organization to anybody that had a
connection to Vince McMahon and try to remove them from the organization, which I don't know
if this is fair, because right now these are just allegations at this point.
Well, they're allegations, but there's a pattern there to back it up.
And so I think they've just got to go in and clean house.
I mean, I just can't believe what's been going.
on for so long, it's just astonishing.
And so the fact is that they won't have any transparency, you know, seize the opportunity
now to basically clean house, make sure this never happens again, and that they have basically
a transparent and legal and non-harming entity.
What do you have you made about the way that TKO group holdings has been responding in light
of these developments week after week?
Well, you know, I'm not a PR expert, but I'm sure
had a lot of sex cases. And the fact is, is that you've got to
basically get in and handle everything. And you've got to
basically, Mayacolpa apologize, no matter if you were involved
before or not, this is your baby now. And you've got to make sure that you
come out and say we're to make sure we make everybody whole. And also,
you want to probably do a community service, which is we want to go out and help
other victims. We want to make sure this doesn't happen in any other
industry because it's so huge. And it's theirs right now. They're the ones holding the
bag right now. Has Vince McMahon's side released a statement in the wake of this news of Ashley
Massaro? I haven't seen any new statements unless you have. I certainly haven't seen any
in the last 24 hours or so. That may have passed me by. I haven't. And I just was curious if you
had saw something. And before we let this go, there's also another individual named Kevin Dunn.
Kevin Dunn is mentioned in this as well. If you can briefly explain who,
he is because my understanding is he's one of the people that allegedly knew about some of these
allegations. So Kevin Dunn for over 30 years was basically head of TV production. He oversaw
how episodes of Raw and Smackdown and all WWE's pay-per-views were shot. He is, he's
described by everybody that has worked with him as every bit a Vince McMahon guy, somebody that is
very much the right-hand man of Vince McMahon, somebody that is very much a yes man,
allegedly for Vince McMahon. So it was a surprise to see his name come up because I didn't
know how intrinsically involved he was with the Ashty Mazzaro case, but it's also not a surprise
because he was so deeply connected with Vince McMahon that even just before Vince McMahon
finally stepped away and it led it's led many to believe that there was an indicator that maybe
there was more to come with regards to these allegations because Kevin Dunn who was set to be
a lifetime WWE employee he would essentially die in his production seat left the company
before Christmas and hasn't been in that position since then so it was interesting that
with Vince McMahon finally coming away from WWE,
have been done follow shortly after.
I wanted to ask you what you think the effect of this is going to be
on the WWE, on the Janelle Grant lawsuit,
on Vince McMahon.
How is this going to factor into the overall story moving forward
in terms of the company in McMahon?
What we're seeing happening ever since the Janelle Grant lawsuit
is more cases come to light like this.
And it's bringing other cases.
back to the foreground as well.
We have spoken more about Rita Chatterton
than we have in many years
as a result of the Janelle Grant case coming forward.
As a result of the Janelle Grant case coming forward,
we've spoken more about Rita Chatterton.
We've spoken more about other instances like this.
And whilst they are,
and I always err on this side,
they are still allegations until a court case is completed.
Whilst they are all allegations,
They all feel eerily similar in context, in type, in style.
And when it comes to Vince McMahon, a lot of the things that we hear and see in these cases
and otherwise seem eerily familiar.
I did want to bring up another instance that kind of adds to the Ashty Masaro case.
It's a bit out of left field, this one, but it kind of adds some weight to the idea,
to the allegations that Vince McMahon would write with bad intention for somebody when he didn't
get his way. So there was a story that took place in 2009. W.W.E. Raw was, had to be moved
from the Pepsi Center because the Denver Nuggets had got through to the playoffs. It was something
that WWE had that arena booked for over a year. And when they got to the playoffs,
They had to find a new home for WWE Raw that night.
And Vince McMahon wrote the opening segment for Raw that night.
And it was a 20-minute tirade completely aimed at Stan Cronkey,
who was the owner of the Denver Nuggets.
He was all the man behind that arena.
I forget which, but it was a 20-minute tirade
that nobody outside of the upper echelons of business
would have given a damn about
but he made it his point in the first
20 minutes of a wrestling show
to call out Stan Cronkey
saying he should be put in jail for being a
bad businessman. In the main
event of that show, the bad guys
wore Denver Nuggets jerseys
and the good guys
wore Lakers jerseys who they were
facing in the playoffs. It seems
like a bit of a cute aside.
The reason I bring it up
is because it is evidence
that Vince McMahon, as
than when he chooses to, will happily scrub 20 minutes of a program, maybe entire segments of
a program, maybe an entire wrestling run for the sake of airing some of his personal grievances.
That's an interesting insight right there, Tom.
It's a real aside, and I don't want it to come across as too light and comical, but I think
it's a really important real life example of when Vincent Mann has gone, I have an axe to grind.
I'm going to use my position, my power position, to grind it.
Tom Campbell and Bramner, thank you both so much for coming on.
Really appreciate it.
Pleasure. Thank you.
Thank you for having us.
All right, everybody.
That is all we have for you right now here on Sidebar.
Thank you so much for joining us.
As always, please subscribe on Apple Podcast, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcast.
I'm Jesse Weber.
I'll speak to you next time.
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