The Misery Machine - Chris Benoit: The Dark Side of the Ring

Episode Date: March 16, 2020

This week, Drewby and Yergy delve deep into the chilling real-life story of Chris Benoit, a Canadian professional wrestler with an illustrious career (WWF/WWE, WCW, ECW, NJPW) that was found dead by suicide due to hanging after murdering his wife and young son. This was a high profile case given Benoit being at the top of the WWE at the time, and came with many theories about what the motive was or if Benoit was the one responsible at all. Also present in the autopsy was Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) which claimed Benoit had the brain of "an 85 year old Alzheimer's patient" by one doctor. We cover the rampant use of steroids and painkillers in wrestling, the lack of action from promotions who discover their wrestlers are abusing drugs, and the string of deaths of wrestlers at young ages from heart complications tied to the misuse of steroids and other substances.  Join Our Facebook Group to Request a Topic: https://t.co/DeSZIIMgXs?amp=1 Support Our Patreon For More Unreleased Content: https://www.patreon.com/themiserymachine Instagram: miserymachinepodcast Twitter: misery_podcast #truecrime #documentary #mystery

We're the misery machine. I'm Yergy. I'm Drewby. And this week, we're doing something kind of near and dear to my heart, something that I followed. Ever since I was a little kid, which is pro wrestling. But this isn't about pro wrestling as a whole. This is about Chris Benoit, which unfortunately became a meme later. I'm sure you guys know of him.

If you don't know who he is, he is a very famous pro wrestler that killed. his wife, his child, and it himself. But we'll get into that. First, however, I must read these Apple Podcast reviews because I said I would do it because I said so. Right? Right. Do it. Okay. I'm going to do it.

I'm going to do it. Give it the love. I'm going to give the, I'm going to give it to. Okay, so this first one. Give you don't give it to you. Oh, oh. Can you do a good like dog barking noise? No, I can't.

Because I can't either. That's not how DMX says. It's like a little puppy. Sir, are you aware that X is going to give it to you? Did you know that DMX was at the Portland Mall last fall and bought a bunch of shoes? Are you sure that was him? I thought that was Waka Flaka Flame. No, DMX was at the Portland Mall and went to journeys and bought some shoes for people.

Really? Okay. I thought that was Waka because one of my friends got a picture with WakaFlock a Flak of Flame and he sent it to our Snapchat group. Nope, it was definitely DMX. Oh. interesting. I guess rappers like to come here too. I don't know why he was here, but...

I mean, probably he was playing a show somewhere that I didn't know about, which is my case with everything. Anyways, so this one says, interesting and smart. I've been binging the podcast and thoroughly enjoying it. The hosts are intelligent and do great research, keeping things

fun and interesting while talking about dark stuff. This is my favorite kind of podcast. Well done, y'all. And that's Jenny from the Wives. Tales podcast, which you should check out. I also appreciate the y'all, because I'm from Georgia. You're not really from Georgia. Shut up, okay?

It still means it's still, what the fuck is this? Rapper DMX buys a family shoes at the main mall. And there's a picture of these two girls. They look really, like, they look pretty young, but not, obviously not too young, because one has tattoos, and they're all like smiling ear to ear, and here's DMX in the middle looking hard as fuck. I love this. This is beautiful.

This is beautiful. And then there's a picture of him with his back, turned to the Camry's work, and something at the cash register in one of the girls. He does a smug pose behind him with arms crossed. It says she's starting seventh grade at Ellsworth Middle School, but she clearly has chest and arm tattoos. Maybe it's the other girl. I don't know, man.

I don't know. I wonder if he bought the socks. If he bought the socks. So I worked at the Bangor Journeys, and their upsell was to try to sell a package of socks every time you sold some shoes. And really, you were supposed to try to sell more than one pair of shoes at the same time. So at the end of the night, to meet our metrics, we were constantly just buying socks. I had a dresser full of fucking Journey socks at the time. So you could try to make our quotas.

Of course, I got it with my 40% discount, but I had so many pairs of socks. I just don't walk into places that I know there's people working there that need commissions to live because, one, I empathize and two, I don't fuck with salesmen in that type of setting. So I just avoid it all together so I don't end up coming off like a dickbag. Plus, I don't, if I'm going to get shoes, I'm going to go and get some, get them someplace for actually a decent price, not overpriced like journeys. Well then, we had good sales. Maybe you did sometimes. I didn't even know there was a journey's at the Portland Mall. I thought that was long gone.

No, it's by the food court. Okay. All right. All right. Enough about selling footwear to people. And DMX. What you really want. What you really want?

Oh, oh. Anyway. Okay. Stop talking shit. I'm not. All right. This one says, Love the banter between the hosts.

Very well done. I'm not a big true crime fan, but the show is very enjoyable. Lots of lull moments from minutia men. Please check out minutia men. And I do appreciate when anyone that's not into true crime, I wasn't really into true crime myself, although I was a big serial killer nerd growing up, which apparently is a normal thing to be now. Yeah, it really is.

Back then we were like really weird. Yeah, back then people just thought you're going to shoot the school up. So, you know, it's just funny how things have changed. But it really, when people who aren't in a true crime are like, hey, I like what you do, that's, that shit feels good, man. Feels good. So this one is from Meg Kay's. These are natural hosts.

Since starting my own podcast, I have a hard time listening to other ones in the same category. But y'all are the exception. There's that y'all are going to love it. You are so natural together and I love it. Keep it up, Megan from Slein Slews. And please check out Slein Slews. Yes, I love these types of reviews. Okay, okay, okay, two more.

This one is a great host, interesting information. I'm really enjoying this podcast from Alessoris Rex. Thank you so much. And this one comes all the way from Osse. Australia. I love this podcast. It's fantastic. The host, Drewby and Yergi give an in-depth view into the cases they cover. Five stars from the Stolen Lives podcast. Please check them out. Please give love to our friends down under. Yes. One day I will visit Australia. I would love to.

I really, really want to see some things there. There's some things I definitely don't want to see because, you know. I want to see those. Three quarters of Australia will just kill you, but you know. I want to see those things. You want to see the things that kill you? Yeah. I mean, maybe I could be convinced. I don't know.

I want to see a huntsman spider and some funnel webs and some secrets. I just want to see some ruse try to punch a dude in the face. Have you seen those? Yeah. There's this one of this dude's parachuting and the kangaroos just come up and they just hit him. Aw. And there's another one where this kangaroo is fucking with this dude's dog. And he gets in between him and the dog gets away.

And the dude just slugs the kangaroo in the face and the kangaroo just turns. turns his head to the side and then looks surprised and just stares at him. The guy just calmly walks away and the kangaroo is just, okay, all right, I deserve that. That's animal abuse. Yes, but if a kangaroo is trying to hurt my beloved animal, you better believe I'm going to hit that thing. I don't know. That's not abuse.

I don't know. You're protecting a creature that you love. I would just chase it away. You would chase away something that could kill you by kicking you with its feet. I don't know. It's not like he's just punching a koala. I'm not victim blaming the dog. You're victim blaming the dog.

This poor dog, he just shouldn't have been there. He should have known better. I mean, why would he be over there? Why was he dressed like that? Yergy, you are very problematic right now. I am extremely problematic. You're going to get canceled. I hope so.

It's not like this dude was like, oh, look at this three-toed sloth that sleeps 23 hours a day. I'm just going to punch the shit out of it. That's not what's going on. Enough about fucking... Everything. Fucking everything. Let's talk about. Chris Benoit. Literally fucking everything.

Because I'm very excited that you've picked an episode. Yes, that I... I'm very excited that I picked. Because when I pick episodes, they're wonderful. And I don't care if you don't think they're wonderful. I think they're wonderful. I think your episodes are wonderful. And that's all that matter. I'm talking to you, the listener. The listener. The listener. Drewby rarely picks episodes. Drewby's just like, oh yeah, I've heard of this. Yeah, we can do it.

I think the last time you picked one was Cleveland Torso Killer. Because I really wanted to talk about Elliot Ness. And before that was Peter Curtin. It was Peter Curtin. I think those are the only... I thought I picked one more, but I can't remember. I think we were like mutual on the body positivity is toxic. We were.

I was about to say that, and I remember that was something we were talking about for a while. I mean, we talked about it before the inception of this podcast. So, yeah, it was just bound to happen eventually. God, we just keep bringing up that episode. We need to just do this again. Yeah, we need a part two. And I think when we do that episode, we should get people's thoughts on it. So if you'd like to record...

a clip for upcoming body positivity episode that I just created. I just said it was going to be happened. If you'd like to record a clip and share your experiences with body positivity, and when I say that, I don't mean in a positive way how you feel either left behind by the body positivity movement, how you feel you may have been hurt or sexualized in a negative way, or if you just feel glamorized or if you feel like you are almost being fetishized for either body types, identity, what have you, something that people don't talk about in regards to body positivity. If you'd like to record that, please, please, please do so, hit us up.

We will gladly put it out here because I want to hear from more people than just me and Yergy. We've already kind of shared our story and we're going to go more in depth in that, I'm sure. But what I care about more is other people because I think the same. is something that is not talked about at all. So yeah, that's my spiel. Yes. And through the miracle of editing, Drewby is very good at putting your clips into the episode. I'm very good at dumping the clip. Dumping the clip. All right. Chris Benoit. Chris Benoit. Chris Benoit. Christopher Michael Benoit was a Canadian professional wrestler. During his 22-year career, Benoit worked for numerous promotions, including the World Wrestling Federation.

now known as the World Wrestling Entertainment, WWF, WWE. He worked for World Championship Wrestling, as most people know, is WCW, that's worked for ECW and New Japan Pro Wrestling. Industry journalist Dave Meltzer considered him one of the top 10, maybe even the top five all-time greats. And Dave Meltzer is probably the leading wrestling journalist. Out of all of them, he's probably the most notable one, the one that's been doing it the longest.

So that's no small compliment. He held 22 championships between the WWF, WCW, NJPW, ECW. He was a two-time world champion, having been a one-time WCWWWWWWW-weight champion, a one-time World Heavyweight champion in the WWE. He was booked to win a third world championship at a WWE event on the night of his death. He was the 12th WWE Triple Crown Champion and 7th WCW Triple Crown Champion with the second of four men in history to achieve. both the WWE and WCW Triple Crown Championships.

He was also the 2004 Royal Rumble winner, joining Sean Michaels as the only two men to win a Royal Rumble as the number one entrant, which means you're the one that enters the ring first, and Royal Rumble is 30 people. Benoit headline multiple pay-per-views for the W.W.E., including a victory in the World Heavyweight Championship main event match of WrestleMania 20 in 2004.

So you're probably hearing all this and like, wow, this guy was a really good athlete. Well, he was a really good athlete, but I should probably be clear. Wrestling is fake. People are going to get mad at this. Okay, it's... There's still some athleticism there.

Yes, there's athleticism. But it is theater. It is theater. So what I'm meaning to say here is that he won these because he was scripted to win these. Now, did he earn a push by the company? Did they respect his athletic prowess, his work ethic, and his technical ability, and said, were going to make that guy champion? Yes.

So did he earn it? Yes, in other ways he just didn't beat the pulp out of somebody in order to get the championship. It's like working your way up in a company. Let me be clear before all the wrestling nerds and smarks freak out on me. So in a double murder and suicide, Benoit murdered his wife on June 22nd, 2007, and his son on June 23, 2007. and hanged himself on June 24th, 2007. Research suggests depression and chronic traumatic encephalopathy, also known as CTE.

A condition of brain damage from numerous concussions are likely contributing factors leading to the crimes. And we don't plan to touch on his ring feuds and all that stuff. We cut out a lot of the fluff of his career because I'm sure most people listening here don't want to know about what wrestlers he was feuding with. But it is worth mentioning a little bit about his career and then we'll go into the murder afterwards. But trust me, there's not going to be much.

Right. We don't want to end up with another Aaron Hernandez situation where poor Drewby is up until 3 in the morning editing. Yeah. And we cut out so much from there because I was just like, why are we talking about his college stats right now? But anyways, let's get to it. Benoit was born in Montreal, Quebec, son of Michael and Margaret Benoit.

He grew up in Edmonton, Alberta. from where he was built throughout the bulk of his career. He had a sister living near Edmonton. During his childhood and early adolescence in Edmonton, Benoit, idolized Tom, Dynamite, Kid, Billington, and Brett Hart. At 12 years old, he attended a local wrestling event which the two performers stood out above everyone else. Benoit trained to become a professional wrestler in the Hart family dungeon,

receiving education from family patriarch Stu Hart. In ring, Benoit emulated both Billington and Brett Hart, cultivating a high-risk style and physical appearance more reminiscent of the former. Years later, he adopted Hart's trademark sharpshooter, hold as a finishing move. So Tom Billington, the Dynamite Kid, was one half of the British Bulldogs. The true British Bulldog, Davey Boy Smith, that people usually know the moniker British Bulldog by, that this is not him, but they were a part of a tag team called the British Bulldogs, and Dynamite Kid was one of them.

That's where Chris Benoit got his diving headbut from. because Tom Billington or Dynamite Kid used to do that. And oddly enough, Dynamite Kid died later in life. And it's thought that he died due to brain damage or CTE or just advanced CTE and things like that. So it's just kind of interesting when you look at both cases. Obviously, we'll get into that. But yeah, they both took a lot of hits to the head. So he began his career in 1985 in Stu Hart's Stampede Wrestling Promotion.

He then did what most up-and-coming wrestlers do and started wrestling in Japan. He wrestled in New Japan Pro Wrestling. He spent about a year training in their New Japan Dojo. He made his Japanese debut under his real name, which he wrestled most of his life under his real name, which is most wrestlers don't wrestle under their real name. They'll have pseudonyms. But the one time he had a pseudonym, he was known as the Pegasus Kid and he wore a mask. Benoit said numerous times that he originally hated the mask, but it eventually became a part of him.

He then had a brief stick. with WCW and then was signed to ECW by then Chairman Paul Heyman. He was booked as a dominant wrestler there gaining notoriety as the crippler after he put Rocco Rock out. I believe he suplexed somebody while Rock O Rock was on a table and it knocked him out. The other reason they started calling him the crippler was Benoit accidentally broke Sabu's neck within the opening seconds of a match. So the injury came when Benoit threw Sabu with the intention that he was going to

to go faced first. They call it a pancake bump. So basically he was lifting him over his head and he was going to push him up and Sabu was supposed to land on his chest. Well, Sabu thought that Chris Benoit was doing another type of move that would require him to turn over onto his back. So because of this, he didn't achieve full rotation and landed directly on his neck. There's a video on YouTube and it's pretty brutal. It's pretty gross. Yeah. And so after this match, Benoit returned to the locker room and broke down over the possibility that he might have paralyzed somebody. So Paul Heyman, the chairman head booker of ECW at the time, came up with the idea of continuing the crippler moniker for Benoit.

From that point until his departure from ECW was known as Crippler Benoit. When he returned to WCW in 95, WCW modified his ring name to Canadian Crippler Chris Benoit. Hayman commented in the rise and fall of ECW book that he planned on using Benoit's a dominant heel for quite some time before putting the company's main title, the ECW World Heavyweight Championship on him to be the long-term champion of a company. So if you don't know what a heel means, in wrestling, there's bad guys and good guys. Good guys, the crowd cheers for are faces, and bad guys are called heels. And as far as the crippler moniker's concern, that stuck with him

for his entire career up until his death. In WWE, he was called just called Crippler Chris Benoit, or the Crippler and his finishing move was called the Cripler Cross Face. He was forced to leave ECW after his work visa expired. Haman was supposed to renew it, but he failed to make it on time. So Benoit left as a matter of job security and the ability to enter the United States. So he toured Japan until WCW called and then he later returned to WCW. New Japan Pro Wrestling and WCW had a working relationship and because of their talent exchange program, Benoit signed with the WCW in late 1995, along with a number of talent working in New Japan's, be part of the angle. While working in WCW again, Booker Kevin Sullivan wrote a script that he and Benoit would be

feuding. This led to the two having violent confrontations at paper views, which led to Sullivan booking a feud in which Benoit was having an affair with Sullivan's real-life wife and on-screen valet Nancy, who at the time her ring name was woman. Benoit and Nancy were forced to spend time together to make their affair look real, such as hold hands in public and share hotel rooms. This was actually more common back in the older days of wrestling, where if you were a heel, you were not allowed to be seen with faces, especially somebody you were feuding with. Like they were so intent on keeping the... Like the angle going?

Yeah, the act, like the whole show of wrestling. They wanted it to be believable in real sounding. So this on-screen relationship developed into a real-life affair off-screen. As a result, Sullivan and Benoit had a contentious backstage relationship at best. At best. At best. Benoit did, however, admit to having a certain amount of respect for Sullivan, saying on the DVD hard knocks the Chris Benoit story that Sullivan never took undue liberties in the ring during their feud,

even though he blamed Benoit for breaking up his marriage. Yeah, I was fucking his wife, but you know, he's a good dude. Yeah. This continued for over the course of a year, with Sullivan having his enforces apprehend Benoit in a multitude of matters. matches. This culminated in a retirement match at the bash of the beach where Benoit defeated Sullivan. This was used to explain Sullivan going to a behind-the-scenes role where he could focus on his initial job of booking. However, due to disagreements with management and to protest the promotion

of Kevin Sullivan to head booker, Benoit left the company the next day alongside his friends Eddie Guerrero, Dean Malenko, and Perry Saturn, forfeiting his WCW title in the process. But they then refused to acknowledge Benoit's victory as an official title reign, and Benoit's title reign was not listed in the title lineage at wcw.com. However, the WWE recognized Benoit's title win and Benoit's title reign is still listed in the title lineage at www.com. Benoit spent the next few weeks in Japan before heading to the WWF, now known as WWE, who acknowledged his WCW World Heavyweight Championship win and presented him as a former world champion. So along with Guerrero, Saturn, and Melenko, Benoit debuted in the WWF slash E as a staple that became.

came known as the radicals. Yeah, and that was the only stable he was ever a part of, I believe. Definitely the last stable he was a part of. Stables, for those that don't know. I have no idea what the fuck that is. I was just like reading that. I'm like a stable. So a tag team is two people, right?

So the road warriors, Edge and Christian, the Hardy Boys, those are consists of two people. A stable is a wrestling group, so more than two people. So the ministry, Degeneration X, the corporation, those are considered stables because they're in there exists multiple wrestlers, not just two people. Benoit suffered a neck injury in a four-way tables, ladders, and chairs match that required surgery with Dr. Lloyd Youngblood, who I believe is the leading. I think everybody that works at the WWE and has to get surgery goes to this dude because I know Stone Cold Steve Austin had his neck surgery done with Dr. Youngblood. On March 14th, 2004, WrestleMania 20, Benoit won the World Heavyweight Championship by forcing Triple H to tap out to his finishing move of the Cripler Crossface. The match was the first time that a WrestleMania main event ended in a submission.

On November 13th, 2005, Benoit's best friend Eddie Guerrero was found dead in his hotel room. The following night, Ra held a Guerrero tribute show hosted by both Raw and Smackdown wrestlers. Benoit was devastated at the loss of his best friend and was very emotional during his series of video testimonials, eventually breaking down on camera. You can watch these on YouTube. They are still up. Some of his colleagues state that he was never the same after Eddie's death. I was still watching wrestling at the time. And Eddie Guerrero was a very big name. And that was, that was very shocking. I believe he died of a heart attack in his hotel room, which quite a few wrestlers tend to die of heart conditions. And you know, I can just speculate, but some people link

this to steroid use. Anabolic. Yeah. Things like. like that. So on June 11th episode of Raw Benoit was drafted from Smackdown to ECW. So a little bit of background, ECW was a separate wrestling promotion. The WWE bought them out. The WW also later bought out WCW. And they now basically have a big monopoly on wrestling. But in buying ECW, since ECW was so popular with the fans, they had this angle where there was ECW wrestlers, there's going to be ECW matches and and stuff like that. And there was going to be, like, the Raw and Smackdown brand had different wrestlers. Well, the ECW brand was going to be all these wrestlers only.

I don't remember this very much because this is around the time I stopped watching wrestling. It was like 2006, I believe. It was basically when the attitude area was dead and buried because it became so PG-rated, and I just wasn't into that anymore. So Benoit wrestled his final match in June 19th, 2007, defeating Elijah Burke to, determined who would compete for the vacated ECW World Championship at Vengeance on June 24th. Benoit missed the week in house shows telling WWE officials that his wife and son were vomiting blood due to food poisoning. When he failed to show up to the paper view, which is a huge deal, by the way,

viewers were informed that he was unable to compete due to a family emergency, and he was replaced in the title match by Johnny Nitro, who won the match and became the ECW world champion. The crowd spent the majority of the match chanting for Benoit. WBWE executive Stephanie McMahon later indicated that Benoit would have defeated CM Punk for the championship had he been present for the event. So Benoit included a wide array of submission holds in his move set and used the cross face, dubbed the crippler cross face, and a sharpshooter as finishers. The sharpshooter being Brett the hitman heart's signature finishing move. If you know wrestling, you probably know what I'm talking about. So he also used a diving headbut to finish opponents, which is ridiculous.

Yeah, which he also... You showed me that the other night. I'm like, what the fuck? Yeah, so he took that from the Dynamite Kid, Tom Billington. Yeah, so the thing with a diving headbutt is the first, I remember reading the first time he said he ever did it, it knocked the wind out of him, and he said he was never going to do it again.

Then later in his career, he started doing it again. And the thing with a diving headbut is there's no, again, if anyone has wrestled on any sort of amateur circuit, I would love to hear from you. But my understanding the diving headbut is there's no real safe way to do it. because you either hit your head. It is to make it look like you, you were doing the head butt to somebody else's head.

However, you're not actually hitting them in the head in it, but if you botch it, obviously, you go head to head. But I've seen him smack his head off of people's shoulders, chest, or you hit your head off the canvas. You know, maybe if you're lucky, you just hit chest first, but then I would assume your neck snaps a little bit. And he was doing this just about every match. And taking blows like that to the head,

I remember watching him do it off of a steel cage once in a hell and a cell match. And I just can't imagine taking that over and over and what that does to your head or if that will lead to CTE. And a lot of people blame that finishing move for the fact that Chris Benoit had major CTE. But Benoit was a very technical wrestler and hailed for his technical skill. He used a lot of suplexes. Probably his more go-to ones were the snap variation. and German, German suplexes. He didn't invent this, but he probably was the first one in the modern era

to do three rolling German suplexes. So he would do a German suplex, hold on to it, get back to the feet, do another one, then do another one. You might have seen, if you watch wrestling, see Brock Lesnar doing this, and he called it suplex city. Seems excessive. You know, so Chris Jericho, who was still a very popular, wrestler, believe he's retired now. He used to do something called, I believe it's called a Jericho

Powerbomb and he didn't do it later in his career because you'll probably understand why once I explain what it is, but he would power bomb you, which power bombing somebody is aided by the person getting power bombed and the person doing the power bombing. Sounds all very sexual. Okay, well, it's not, but it is two greased up men rolling around on a canvas so I can see why you might think that. However, so when you power bomb somebody, like, they push off the ground and help you, unless they're sandbagging, help you pick them up over your head. However, what the Jericho power bomb is, he would do the power bomb, the dude lands on his back. He would hold the dudes by his hips or his legs, and he would use, like, his just all lower back, lift them up again from that position and then drop them again. And every time he did this, he would yell loudly like he was doing like a big deadlift, which I mean, clearly you're lifting a man like that.

It's not easy. And, you know, again, if anyone's wrestled in the amateur circuit can explain that one away, please do. But just the position that they're in, the person getting power bomb for the second time can't push off the canvas, can't aid with the lift. You know, any wrestling move that requires somebody getting picked up. The person getting picked up, you'll notice it's almost as if they jump with them. Their legs move almost in unison. And this is to make it easier on the wrestler. So they're not picking up a full-grown man all the time in these weird positions.

That's one that's completely unaided. So yeah, I don't. Yeah, you were speaking of excessive. Yeah, sometimes people just do excessive things. I don't know. I think my favorite move that you showed me in that kind of compilation we watched last night was like the gravestone one. I think it was also. Oh, the tombstone pile.

driver. So that was cool. So Chris Ben Wyn is very early career used to use the tombstone pile driver, which was basically innovated by the undertaker, which is a pile driver. I'm assuming most people know what a pile driver is. However, you would fall to your knees. And the importance in doing good pile driver from that position anyways is that the person's head is tucked like around the crotch area. So that way the person doing the tombstone, their knees hit first. And so the person getting pile-dived doesn't take anything to their head at all. So it's just basically like, you know, it looks dangerous, but it's not. However, a more traditional pile driver is where the person falls to their butt.

And so this is a little bit more dangerous to pull off. But the same thing is true. You know, the butt takes the impact. The head doesn't. Stone Cold Steve Austin had his neck broken by Owen Hart because Owen Hart did a pile driver and botched it and Steve's head took the whole fucking brunt and like snapped his neck and uh which was quite in it put them in a bad situation because stone coal was supposed to win that match so here's owen heart not sure what to do because he just broke Steve austin's neck how are they going to continue

he's not supposed to win so he's walking around the ring talking shit to the crowd but you can see the look in his eyes that he's just like oh no i might have just killed someone. one and Steve Austin rolls him up, pins him really weakly, but just enough what he had to be done and walks out of there, like, fighting off everybody who's trying to help him because he's just so pissed off. He had two screws put in his neck. Yeah, there's, it's crazy when you see people break their neck and wrestling and just get up and walk away. It just blows me away. But yeah, if you want to see worse stuff than that, I can show you, I can show you some of the

wrestling moves they do in Japan since they just love to drop each other on their heads. You should probably just show me that. Yeah, there's this move called the Burning Hammer, and it's only been done seven or eight times in the Kenta Kobashi, who does it. I think I said his name right. He was only allowed to do it under very specific circumstances because it is very, at least the original version, it hyper extends someone's neck and forces them to be dropped on their head. So that way they can't roll with it. It's just absolutely just devastating looking. And he later changed it so that way they could at least.

kind of roll with it a little bit. That moves like that are banned in the WWE. In fact, the pile driver after Steve Austin broke his neck got banned and only the undertaker is allowed to do it under approval of Vince McMahon because he's done it for so long. They trust him with it. But no one else can do a pile driver. There was this, there's this famous match between, oh my God, it was some Japanese wrestler in the WWE and Brian Kendrick, I think. And this was supposed to be one of Brian Kendrick. last matches and he did the burning hammer on this Japanese guy. They talked about it beforehand and were cool with it. But obviously, like if Vince McMahon or anyone in WW corporate knew, they would have nixed

that and he did it live and they all so fucking pissed. Nothing happened to the guy. But yeah, he figured because he was leaving that he might as well do one of the most dangerous fucking moves. I'm going to pause this and show Yergi because you should definitely see this. So by show Yergy, I showed Yergy and then we went down this rabbit hole of watching a bunch of dangerous wrestling moves. There's basically a bunch of amateur wrestlers just spike each other on their head. And then Drupi went to poker.

And then Drewby went to poker. And then Yurgy just sat around watching videos of The Undertaker. Which is totally not who we're covering. No, but that's what I did for a good hour. Why The Undertaker, other than he's one of the most, probably the more goth. Because he's more goth adjacent. He's one of them that I recalled from my child. You clearly need to check out the brood then because they were actually goths and then they would go around giving people blood baths.

Okay, well, we can do that later. We were not going to take another break for this because we actually have to, it's now a new day. Yeah, no, I'll show you Gangrel versus Scott Taylor. And he like spits blood all over him. It's wonderful. It's wonderful. So, okay, before we make this an hour and a half. Do you remember when, like, Doyle from the Misfits was wrestling briefly?

I heard about that. I never actually saw him wrestle. I did see Violent Jay and Shaggy Too Dope from ICP or Esol. Jesus. Because they were in the WWF for a brief period of time. They were part of the oddities. That's just silly. Yeah, and then they both got a stone cold stunner.

It was weird because in the back, Stone Cold said in which order he was going to give him the stunner, and then he did it out of order. And so I think Violent J was supposed to get it second, but then he got it first and then he sold it all weird. I don't know. It was pretty funny. But anyways. I don't want people to think we're down with the clowns. or anything because we're not.

We're not. Gross. Stop it. Okay. Anyway. I, okay. One more thing. I need to show you that dude that's like, I'm doing this.

Shout out to all the juggaloes and jugglets. Wooop. And then he just jumps into a bunch of barbed wire or broken glass or he runs head first into a car bumper several times. I need to show you this guy. Okay. We can do that tonight. He is so committed to hurting himself in the name of juggalo's.

Okay. So before we do yoga, juggles. Fucking maggots, sir. Jesus Christ, anyway. How did they work? I don't know. Magnets, not maggots. I said magnets.

Oh, I heard maggots. The end was silent. Okay, so Benoit spoke both French and English fluently. He married twice and had two children named David and Megan with his first wife, Martina. By 1997, that marriage had broken down and Benoit was living with Nancy Sullivan, the wife of the WCW Booker and frequent opponent, Kevin Sullivan. On February 25th, 2000, Chris and Nancy said Daniel was born, and on November 23rd, 2000, Chris and Nancy were married. Shotgun. Oh, yeah.

My goodness. It was Nancy's third marriage. In 2003, Nancy filed for divorce from Benoit, citing the marriage was irrevocably broken, alleging cruel treatment. She claimed that he would break and throw furniture around. She later dropped the suit as well as the restraining order she had filed. Benoit became good friends with fellow wrestler Eddie Guerrero, following a match in Japan when Benoit kicked Guerrero in the head and knocked him out cold. This started a friendship that lasted even after Guerrero's death in late 2005, in which Benoit

had written diary entries to him just 10 days after his passing. The content became precognition of Benoit's own demise. Benoit was also close friends with Dean Melenko as the trio traveled from promotion to promotion together putting on matches, eventually being dubbed the three amigos by commentators. According to Benoit, the crippler crossface was. borrowed from Malenko and eventually caught on his Benoit's signature hold. Benoit's lost tooth, his top right lateral incisor, was commonly misattributed to training or an accident early on in his wrestling career. It was actually resulted from an accident

involving his pet Rottweiler. One day, while playing with the dog, the animal's skull struck Benoit's chin and his tooth just popped out. I could see that happening. Those are big heads, like my mom's dog Rocco. Yeah, yeah. Then the big dogs, they weigh a lot. Cough, cough, cough. Whoop, who. It's my COVID-19. COVID-19. Oh.

We're both sick with COVID-19. We don't know that, but it could happen. We just had the first outbreak in Maine, and it just happens to be in our... Yeah, right where we live. Not southern Maine, not near the borders. Nope, right here. Right here. And we probably have it.

We're going to die. So, Drewby and I literally went grocery shopping. We had panic grocery shopping with masks on. And there was no toilet paper anywhere, except a big, Lots. Like, Drewby actually had a cool mask, but I took a silk scarf that belonged to my grandmother and wrapped it around my face like a bandit. And we went shopping like that.

Yeah, she looked like a desert bandit. Yes, I did. She looked like one of those, what were they from, from Ocaryne of Time, Garudos, something like that. I can't remember what they were called. I know, but it looked kind of cute. I don't even want to get into this because we're going to end up talking for two hours. Okay.

Anyway, I'm posting it on the Instagram so you can see. Okay. So over a three-day period between June 22nd and June 24, 2007, while living in Fayetteville, Georgia, Chris Benoit killed his wife Nancy Benoit and suffocated their seven-year-old son, Daniel, before hanging himself. Autopsy results show that Benoit's wife, Nancy, was murdered first as she was bound at the feet and wrist and died of asphyxiation on June 22nd. Nancy was found wrapped in a towel and with blood under her head. Although Fayette County District Attorney Scott Ballard reported no other signs of a struggle. The couple's son, Daniel Christopher Benoit, also died of asphyxia, apparently killed as he was lying in his bed on the morning of June 23rd.

Then on the evening of June 24th, Benoit committed suicide in his wait room when he used his lat pull-down machine to hang himself. He placed copies of the Bible alongside the bodies of his wife and son, as well as a third Bible next to his own body. Since Benoit's suicide, numerous explanations for his actions have been proposed, including CTE, steroid and alcohol abuse, a failing marriage, probably a lot more. So the incident led to numerous media accounts and a federal investigation into steroid abuse in professional wrestling. So partially the reason why this case garnered so much attention, not just the fact that it was a high-profile professional wrestler, but it was the fact that there was not a lot of explanation as to why and how this happened. So a lot of these things are assumptions.

So starting with Nancy, it wasn't sure if she was attacked, if she was a drugged prior. When they found her, her limbs were bound and her body was wrapped in a towel. They don't know if this was post-mortem or not, but that's how they found her. A copy of the Bible is left by her body. Injuries indicated that Benoit had pressed a knee into her back while pulling a cord around her neck, causing strangulations. Officials say that there were no signs of immediate strangulations. struggle. Toxicologists found alcohol in her body, but were unable to determine whether it had been present before death or was a decomposition product. Decomposition also made it difficult to estimate pre-death levels of hydrocodone and Alprazolam found in therapeutic levels in her body.

In any case, her medical examiner saw no evidence that she was sedated, as her son had been when he was killed. So Daniel was Chris's third child and second son, having older paternal half-sendezed. siblings named David and Megan via Chris's first wife Martina. He was Nancy's only child as she had no children with her ex-husbands, Jim Douse, and Kevin Sullivan. Daniel was suffocated and killed in his bedroom and a copy of the Bible was left by his body. Daniel had internal injuries to the throat area but showed no bruises. Daniel's exact time of death is unknown. The reports determined Daniel was sedated with Xanax and likely unconscious when he was killed. Daniel's body had also just started to show signs of decomposition, but was not as far along as his mother's body.

It was later alleged that Daniel had fragile X syndrome, and that was the cause of the domestic problems in the Benoit family. It was also suggested that needle marks on Daniel's arms were the result of growth hormones given to him because Benoit and his family considered him undersized due to fragile X. Benoit's coworker and best friend wrestler Chris Jericho stated that from his own research on the condition, the symptoms fit Daniel to a T all across the board. With regard to those who had publicly stated they had no knowledge of Daniel having the condition, Jericho said, if Chris had decided that he wanted to keep it to himself, you wouldn't have been able to pry that out of him with anything. Despite Chris Jericho's initial statements regarding Daniel, he later stated in his 2011 book, Undisputed,

it turned out that Daniel didn't have fragile X, but at the time it made sense because I was grasping at straws. District Attorney Ballard later released a statement saying that a source with access to Daniel's medical files found no mention of any pre-existing mental or physical ailments. Likewise, Daniel Benoit's teachers reported that he was on par with other students and not about to be held back as previously thought. Speaking publicly for the first time in a major public interview on Talk is Jericho, which is a podcast hosted by Chris Jericho. Nancy's sister, Sandra Tofoloni, who was intimately related with the Benoit family, unequivocally denied any claims that Daniel ever had fragile X or any other such condition. She also stated that claims of needle track marks on Daniel's arms were, quote, preposterous.

At about 3.30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, Saturday, June 23rd, fellow wrestler and close friend Chavo Guerrero, received a voicemail message from Renoir's phone stating that he had overslept and missed his flight and would be late for that night's house show in Beaumont, Texas. Guerrero called Benoit back and found that Benoit sounded tired and groggy as he confirmed everything that he had said in his voice message. Guerrero, who was concerned about Benoit's tone and demeanor, called him back 12 minutes later. Benoit did not answer the call, and Guerrero left a message asking Benoit to call back. So to be clear, that's not Eddie Guerrero. Chavo Guerrero is Eddie Guerrero's nephew.

The Guerrero family is huge in wrestling. So at 3.44 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, Benoit called Guerrero back, stating that he had not answered the call because he was on the phone with Delta Airlines changing his flight. Benoit stayed that he had a stressful day due to Nancy and Daniel being sick from food poisoning. Guerrero then replied with, all right, man, if you need to talk, I'm here for you. Benoit ended the conversation by saying, I love you, Chavo. I had actually listened to this interview between Chavo Guerrero and Chris Jericho on the Talk Is Jericho podcast. Guerrero said Benoit sounded off when he talked to him, especially when he said, I love you. So they normally say, I love you to each other and stuff like that.

It was just like, hey, Chavo, I love you, trying to get it across like it was a final thing. So that like sat weird with Chavo and Chavo called him back five minutes later. He's like, Chris, are you all right, man? Are you okay? And he's just like, yeah, yeah, I'm just going through a lot. I'm just really tired, man. And he's just like, okay, you just let me know. And that was the very last time they ever talked to him. Another coworker who traveled with Benoit called him from outside the Houston airport and Benoit answered. Benoit told the coworker that Nancy was vomiting blood and that Daniel was also vomiting. I think he may have told somebody that they were both hospitalized. I don't remember though. There were. were several different accounts of that. So on Sunday, June 24th, five text messages were sent to co-workers between 351 a.m. and 358 a.m. using both Chris Benoit and Nancy Benoit's cell phones. Four of them were the Benoit's address. The fifth was said that the family dogs were enclosed in the pool area and also noted that the garage side door had been left open. Guerrero and referee Scott Armstrong were the two recipients of those texts. Yeah, so this was around the time. Thank God he didn't kill the family dogs. Yeah, I know. There was no... I was worried about that. Yeah, I didn't read

anything about that. So this is what kind of played into the conspiracies, which we'll go into a little bit later. But this is around the time where if you sent somebody a text, you know, maybe they don't get it or maybe they just get like a half chunk of it. So when they got these texts are like, were these old texts? Were these meant to be sent to us? We weren't sure. But a lot of people who thought that this was a hit job thought that these came from the people that were killing them, but it's a very, it's a very thin theory. But during this time, Benoit called and left a voicemail for an unknown friend. Benoit later called WWE's talent relations office saying that his son was vomiting, that he and Nancy were in the hospital with him. He also stated that he would

be taking a later flight into Houston, where he was scheduled to face CM Punk for the vacant ECW World Heavyweight Championship at Vengeance Night of Champions. Benoit failed to appear at both of the house show event in Beaumont on the night of Saturday, June 23rd, and the Vengeance Night of Champions pay-per-view event in Houston on the night of June 24th. Chris Benoit, according to District Attorney Ballard and the city sheriff, committed suicide by hanging. Benoit used a weight machine cord to hang himself by creating a noose from the end of the cord on a pull-down machine from which the bar had been removed. Benoit released the weights causing his strangulation.

Ballard said Benoit was found hanging from the pulley cable. On the 2016 Talk is Jericho podcast, Nancy's sister Sandra Topholoni clarified some details further. She said that over the weekend after the murders, the search history on Benoit's computer showed that he had researched, quote, the quickest and easiest way to break a neck. He had then later used a towel around his neck attached to the handle of the machine, which he pulled down using a very heavy weight and let go, breaking his neck instantly. On Monday, June 25, 2007, WWE, specifically John Laronitis. Loronitis. Lorinitis. Professionally known as Johnny Ace.

Okay. Was notified of the text messages sent to Chava Gwaro and Scott Armstrong. The company asked the Fayette County Sheriff's Office to check on the Benoit family. After discovering the bodies, the police notified WWE around 4.15 p.m. informing that they had discovered three bodies at the Benoit home, and the house was now ruled as a major crime scene. A suicide note was not discovered during the initial investigation. But a note was later discovered in another Bible that had been included. included in Benoit's possessions that were sent to his first wife.

According to professional wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer, there was a note that was found in the Bible by the mother of Chris's two children, Martina Benoit, who lives in Canada. The Bible was mixed in with Chris's personal belongings that were shipped to them. Chris Benoit's father, Michael Benoit, stated he had a handwritten note in there that said, I'm preparing to leave this earth. So, WWE attorney Jerry McDavitt, appeared on live with Dan Abrams on July 17, 2000. and said that Benoit was prescribed testosterone as part of a treatment for testosterone replacement therapy, which McDevitt said was common medical practice for people who had used steroids in the past and had suffered testicular damage as a result.

It is incredibly common. Yet former wrestler Chris Nowinski stated that Benoit may have been suffering from repeated, untreated concussions throughout his wrestling career, ultimately leading to an unstable mental state. Nowinski was quoted as saying Benoit was one of the only guys who would take a chair shot to the back of the head, is stupid. Yeah. So if you remember the name Chris Nowinski from our Aaron Hernandez episode, he was a former professional wrestler who retired due to CTE and repeated concussions. And now he, I believe he has his PhD and he is a part of this foundation that researches CTE and its effect on athletes. So the thing with the chair shots, so there's a lot of theories about chair shots. So there's a lot of theories about

chair shots. I've heard that those chairs are not actually steel chairs, but they're a weaker material, but still at the same time, you're getting hit in the head with these, and people are swinging these hard at you. I mean, it's kind of hard to, you know, just gingerly swing a chair at someone's head. If you've ever watched steel chair being used in a wrestling match, they swing them pretty hard. I know that, like, after this, they really cut down on using steel chairs to people's heads. I remember Ed, and Christian had, they called it the concerto and they would both take a steel chair and they would hit somebody on both sides of the head at the same time. Or they do the one man concerto where they lay somebody down on top of a steel chair and then just slam them in the head with a steel chair. That

shit doesn't happen anymore. It's for stuff like this. Looking back on it, he was one of the few people to take chair shots to the back of the head. Most people do the whole, I'm stumbling around and they turn the face of the dude with the chair and then they get hit in the front of the head with the share, but he would take it right to the back of the head. So tests conducted on Benoit's brain by Julian Bales, the head of neurosurgery at West Virginia University, showed Benoit's brain was so severely damaged it resembled the brain of an 85-year-old Alzheimer's patient. Other tests conducted on Benoit's brain tissue revealed severe chronic traumatic encephalophathy, which is CTE, and damaged to all four lobes of

the brain and brain stem. Jesus Christ. My God. Bales and his colleagues concluded that repeated concussions can lead to dementia, which can contribute to severe behavioral problems. Benoit's father said that brain damage may have been the leading cause of the double murder suicide. A statement released by the W.W.E. dismiss the idea as speculative. Nancy Benoit filed for divorce in May 2003, allegedly after domestic abuse from Chris, but had withdrawn in August 2003. In February 2008, the Atlanta Journal Constitution reported that Nancy may have suspected her husband of having an affair with a female WWE wrestler. and that they may have also argued over a life insurance policy.

They claim the source was recently released from the Fayette County Sheriff's Office. Speaking on the matter in his autobiography, The Hardcore Truth, Hardcore Holly speculates that the main influence in Benoit's actions was alcohol abuse rather than steroids. Holly and Benoit traveled together on the road during the time in WWE, and Holly did not believe steroids played a factor, and that Benoit had tended to drink more than he normally would consider. assume when issues with Nancy arose. And this whole idea about steroids making you really rage-filled and this whole term of roid rage is turning out to be a myth. There's a lot of studies coming out

that show that roid rage isn't something that they can prove, that steroids just don't make you go nuts and want to kill somebody. What they are finding is that people who commit violent acts have higher rates of poly substance abuse, including steroids. That the abuse of steroids does not lead to violent acts, but that if you're somebody who commits violent acts, you're also more prone to have other types of addictive detrimental behaviors, such as abusing substances, especially steroids. And in the case of Benoit, it's hard to say that what he did was caused by roid rage. Yeah, there were steroids found in the home. and some doctors have linked steroid used to uncontrollable anger, among other psychological issues, which include paranoia.

But the WW released a press statement challenging the royd rage claims. One part of the statement reads, The physical findings announced by authorities indicate deliberation, not rage. The wife's feet and hands were bound and she was asphyxiated, not beaten to death. By the accounts of the authorities, there were substantial periods of time between the death of the wife and the death of the son, again suggesting deliberate thought, not rage. The presence of a Bible by each body is also not an act of rage, and I agree with that. All right, that's plans, even if awkward still plans.

Yeah, now, could you say he was brain damaged? Yeah, absolutely you could. And some people talk about how steroid abuse can do things to the body and the brain. Okay, that's totally fine, but to say that this is roid rage, it just does not make any sense in this case. He'd not go into a blinding rage and just kill them violently. This was very, very planned. However, with that said, the WWE has this reputation for being very lax about their wrestlers using steroids. And they tend to like really big dudes.

You're a big wrestler. You tend to get more of a push than a smaller wrestler. So with Ben Juan, his death allegedly linked to steroid abuse, the WWE went under investigation by the United States House Committee on Oversight and Government reform regarding their talent wellness policy. Congress did not take action against the WWE or other professional wrestling companies in the wake of the event, but in January 2009, Henry Waxman, the outgoing chair of the House committee, requested that the Office of National Drug Control Policy Chief John P. Walters examined steroid use in professional wrestling

and take appropriate steps to address the problem. In this letter, Waxman stated that in the first year of WWE's testing program, which began in March 2006, 40% of wrestlers tested positive for steroids and other drugs, even after being warned in advance that they were going to be tested. He also wrote about how wrestlers who test positive for performance enhancers receive light punishment and afterwards can participate in wrestling events. The committee investigation also uncovered how easily wrestlers can secure therapeutic use exemptions so they can continue performing while using steroids. When Waxman staff interviewed Dr. Tracy Ray, a physician contracted by the WWE, Ray claimed that there was shadiness in almost every single

therapeutic use exemption case that I've reviewed. If you look at all these wrestlers that have died, a lot of them have died because of heart issues. Now, again, I'm not a doctor, but if I recall, long-term and excessive steroid abuse can lead to heart conditions, heart attacks, and things of that nature. I mean, you look at Eddie Guerrero, who people alleged use steroids. He died of a heart attack. Look at the macho man, Randy Savage. He had a heart attack while he was driving. The British Bulldog, Davy Boy Smith, heart attack. These are all people who are alleged to do steroids. And there's a thousand examples of this. You even have situations like the Ultimate Warrior, who his cause of death wasn't released. They called it a catastrophic medical condition. And the WWE was really shady

about this because I believe he had just resigned to be a brand ambassador. for the company and he gave some speech, some public speech about how legends will one day die and every legend breathes their last breath or something like that and then die a few days later and nobody will release what happens. But he used steroids. Not just steroids either. It's the fact that you have to perform so often, sometimes night after night after night. A lot of these people abuse painkillers too. And other drugs. And other drugs. You look at China. China. She died. from a painkiller overdose and she was alleged to have a painkiller addiction.

And a meth addiction. And a meth addiction. Really? She had a meth addiction? Yep. I didn't know that. Jesus Christ. I did not know she had a meth addiction.

Yeah, there's plenty of wrestlers who, just because of the pain, you have to take painkillers if you want to keep performing. When I look at mixed martial artists, who, again, they're fighting for real. But when I look at professional wrestlers, I know they're not fighting each other, but they're still doing very physical activities. They're still taking bumps and getting hit and...

Just like what that does your joints anyway. Right. So if a professional fighter only fights like two or three times a year, when Cowboy Soroni fights four, five, six times a year, this is considered insane. And he usually goes into fights injured. So if professional fighters have to take so much time off and if a lot of them after they get out of a fight, they're injured one way or the other. Just imagine what a professional wrestler is dealing with wrestling four or five times a week. And that's a common schedule. Like,

you're going to be messed up and you can't just stop performing. You need to get a paycheck still. So you're probably going to take painkillers and you're probably going to get addicted to them. It was like the same situation with Aaron Hernandez's story that we did when he was in college, like all taking painkillers to get by. Yeah. They could get back out on the field. Yeah. Yeah, this is incredibly common with athletes. I know people are like, well, fuck them. They make a ton of money. Well, some of them don't.

Yeah, your football players do. A lot of female fighters do not. Female fighters make shit money. Make shit money. It's really not good. And then even when you're just like, oh, well, this person made $100,000 for this fight, yeah, well, they have to pay a percentage to their camp and their trainers. So they probably take 30% off right there, and then there's taxes.

And it's the fact that you're... You're only getting paid every now and then. It's not as glamorous as people think it is. It's like basically working commission and you don't know what you're going to get. Yeah, you are working commission. And then some people are paid only if they win. Well, not if, okay, so let me rephrase that. They are paid their full purse only if they're win.

They're paid show money and win money. So say you're getting paid 16 and 16. You get 16,000 to show for the fight. And if you win, you get another 16,000. This is how MMA companies save on having to pay their fighters. So better ones will negotiate a higher price to just be paid flat, whether they win or they lose. But it's still just ridiculous to think that some people, like a lot of female fighters don't even make five figures a fight. It's kind of crazy.

It's kind of really crazy. And that women's fight that we saw, Yuanian Jacek versus Wiley Zhang, they were paid about $100,000. thousand apiece to do that to their bodies. They should have gotten more for what they did to their bodies. Yeah, they should get 10 times that. Yawanna is probably going to have to retire after that. And she only fought once this year, may not be able to fight again this year. It's, it's tough. I don't think she should fight again after what happened to her body. No, she gave, she gave everything that she could have. And I don't think she's going to ever put on another performance. I mean, I'm not like about telling women what to do, but she took a fucking horrible beating. Yeah, I'm not about telling any fighter when to hang it up. I get that it's up to them, but it's just a sad case because a lot of fighters, I mean, you look at BJ Penn, they just keep fighting when they're far past the point of when they can fight, when they just get the lights turned out so easily because they've taken too many concussions. And to be fair, she didn't get the lights turned out very easily. She fucking fought wonderfully. Yeah. Like, it was very hard to tell who was going to win that, aside from, like, who visually was more. It was more messed up.

messed up. Yeah. But my goodness. Yeah. Okay. So before we get on too far, let's talk about the toxicology results that they did on all the three bodies. Okay. So at the press conference held by Georgia Bureau of Investigation on July 17, 2007, it was announced

that three different drugs were found in Nancy Benoit's system, hydrochodron, hydro morphone, and Xanax. All three drugs were found to be at levels investigators considered to be normal for therapeutic treatment as opposed to recreational use or abuse. A blood alcohol level was found to be at point one. 184 Chris Sperry the medical examiner added that it was impossible to say whether any of the blood findings was due to ingestion of alcohol or post-mortem process. So it also ruled that Nancy was sedated by Chris before she was murdered. So Xanax was found in Daniel Benoit system.

District attorney Scott Ballard noted that this was not a drug that would be given to a child under normal circumstances. It is believed that Daniel was sedated prior to being murdered with Sperry ruling out that Daniel had died of a drug overdose. The GBI, however, said in the press conference that it would not perform tests for steroid or human growth hormones on Daniel because of the lack of urine. Xanax and hydroconone were also found in Chris Benoit system at the levels investigators called consistent with therapeutic use. Elevated levels of the synthetic antibiotic steroid testosterone cypionate was found in his urine. Investigators believed that the level found suggested it had been taken recently. While the synthetic antibiotic steroid testosterone cyponate was found in his urine, there was no evidence of GBH, contrary to speculation.

GHP contrary. There was definitely some evidence of a GBAH here. Benoit also tested negative for blood and alcohol. So there was drug charges against Benoit's doctor. Phil C. Aston III was the personal doctor for Chris Benoit. His attorney, Mani Aurora, asked a judge to throw out evidence seized during a raid on Ashton's office after Benoit and his family died. He claimed the search exceeded authority granted in a search warrant and that police seized

other patient's records and three years of bank records and computers. According to the Associated Press in February of 08, Aston was charged with overprescribing medication in a case not connected to Benoit. On January 29, 2009, he admitted he illegally prescribed drugs, sometimes without examining the patients first, and pleaded guilty to all 175 counts against him. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison. I didn't know about that one.

So a statement regarding Nancy Benoit's death was added to the Chris Benoit English Wikipedia article 14 hours before police discovered the bodies. of Benoit and his family. This was crazy. Yes. This seemingly prescient edition was initially reported on Wiki News and later on Fox News. The article originally read, Chris Benoit was replaced by Johnny Nitro for the ECW World Championship match at Vengeance, as Benoit was not there due to personal issues stemming from the death of his wife, Nancy. The phrase stemming from the death of his wife, Nancy, was added at 401 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, June 25th, whereas the Fayette County Police reportedly discovered

the bodies of the Benoit family at 2.30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time, 10 hours and 29 minutes later. The IP address of the editor was traced to Stanford, Connecticut, which is also the location of the WWE headquarters. After news of the early death notice reached mainstream media. The anonymous poster accessed Wiki News to explain his edit as a huge coincidence and nothing more. Police detectives then seized computer equipment from the man held responsible for the postings and called the posting an unbelievable hindrance to the investigation, but believed he was otherwise uninvolved, declining to press charges. The man had found several rumors online, which supported his theory about the Benoit family emergency. The IP from which he made the edit was tentatively traced to vandalizing

the Wikipedia entries for African wild ass. The Bronx, the Sopranos, Ron Artec, Stacey Keebler, and Nagatuck, Connecticut. He also reverted vandalism to Chavo Guerrero Jr. and recorded a loss for the Golden State Warriors. So this dude was just out here just scrolling. Just screwing up Wikipedia entries. I remember when this was first brought to attention, they thought it came from inside of the

WWE headquarters and somebody was leaking shit, but that was that was later ruled out. What the fuck is African Wildass? All right. Well, let's find out right now. Let's find out about African wild ass. It is a African wild donkey, isn't it cute?

Aw. Also known as a Somali Wild Okay, so when I was at, I can't remember which zoo I was at. It was either the Tampa Zoo or the Denver Zoo. They had a Somali Wild Ass there. And there was children with teachers going around for their field trips and what have you. And they come to the Somali Wild Ass. And this kid was trying to read it. And the teacher was like, that's a Somali donkey.

And he's like, Wild Ass, ass. Ass. Ass. And I just always remember that. Because it was like, that was me as a little kid. This is very similar to a story that I heard the other day. So my friend's daughter had her spelling test the other day. And she was apparently taking a really, really, really long time to sound out the word country and just kept saying cunt over and over and over again.

And they believed that she was just fucking with everyone and trolling. How old is she? She is eight. You know, I didn't know that word when I was eight. I didn't know that word when I was eight, but I think it's totally plausible for somebody to learn that word. when they're eight. I'm actually surprised I know that word when I was eight. Yeah. Probably because I'm not British. Well, it's just like more common these days. Yeah, no, you're right. You're absolutely right. Also, the internet. So there's a few wrestlers that believe, without a shadow of a doubt, that Chris Benoit never

could do this because he was just too kind of an individual or whatever reason they give. Some of them, I think Hornswoggle was one. I know there's a couple others that believe that an outside person or persons raided the Benoit house, which is not hard to find. only had a single gate around it, went in there and killed all of them. But if this was the case, why wasn't anything taken? And there was also, because of the whole, the dogs are in the, in the pool area. Yeah, in the pool area. Those texts were sent.

They're like, well, what if these are the people raiding sending this? And they meant to send it to each other, but they sent it to us. Like, it's just really flimsy stuff. I believe that Chris Benoit did this. I don't think there was some group of people that came in there just to whack him. his family and not take a single thing. I just don't think the motive is there. But there are wrestlers that to this still believe that he couldn't have done this, where I just think that if you've, if your brain is Swiss cheese, what you can do is limitless. Yeah, I totally agree with you on that.

So yeah, we've been going for about an hour and 10 now. Hopefully by next week we won't be dead due to the coronavirus. I really hope we are not. Because more places in the U.S. are getting locked down now and grocery shelves are bare. I've seen pictures of local Hanifers near us where all of the meat in the meat section is just gone. Just pit clean. Freezer cabinet's gone. People are just taking everything they can. I think that we're good. We stocked up pretty well on supplies. We need to go out one more time today to get, we're going to get some like big bags of rice. Which is fine to say because by the time this is out, we'll already got our

big bags of rice. So, yeah. I think by that point we'll be able to Because they're talking about how people shouldn't, like, certain places are going to be shut down for 90 days, like schools and stuff like that. And so I'm trying to think, you know, can I survive for 90 days like on the food I have? So, yeah, hopefully we'll be good. We'll be good. We're going to get cat food and cat litter probably through prime. Yeah, that will be okay. Yeah, there's still stuff that will deliver Amazon Prime.

So that's pretty cool. But yeah. So hopefully we can stay healthy. And if we're going to get this, I hope we get this now. and before the population in Maine all ends up in the hospital and there's no ventilators to be used because most of Maine's population is very elderly. And if they all get sick, our hospitals don't have enough beds and enough ventilators. Yeah. And I would like to live.

Me too. I just really, really hope that my work does the right thing. And I don't really care if anybody's listening because they really need to do the right thing here and start sending us home. Most people's jobs are allowing them to work from home. There's no reason whatsoever that my department can. can't work off laptops. There are workplaces out there that have employees coming to work with known exposure to the coronavirus and they are not doing anything about it. They are not forcing those people to stay home because they're asymptomatic and they're not. I'll put it out there.

It's my fucking work. Okay. I'll say it. Okay. If you want to say it, yes, your work is doing that and I think it's absolutely just. I mean, fire me over it. I'll fucking sue like fucking crazy. Indefensible. Indefensible. And they're on my floor. Yeah. That's just nuts and they won't tell you who it is or or and they won't make them go home. I just cannot believe that. Just pay that for that person's time off. Yeah. This is ridiculous.

But okay. So until next time, hopefully we'll be alive and well and not dying. Hopefully. Okay. Bye. Bye.