Chris Benoit - double murder suicide? A fact-based analysis.

On Monday June 25 2008, police received an anonymous call, suggesting a visit to the Benoit family home in Fayetteville, Georgia, United States. Upon entering, the police found the bodies of Chris, his wife Nancy and their eight-year-old son, Daniel.

Hours later, police announced that the case was closed. They announced that this was a double murder-suicide. They announced that Chris had murdered wife Nancy on the Friday, son Daniel on the Saturday, before killing himself on the Sunday.

The police hinted that the crimes were committed due to the high levels of steroids in Chris’ system. Chris was a known steroid abuser as a professional wrestler. Police had victims, a suspect, motive and happenstance. No testimony was considered by the police and nobody was questioned.

Pro wrestling is chastised all around the world for being ‘fake’ and a parody on real sport. Let’s agree that this is true. This does not make a man a murderer. For the sake of fairness, assume that Chris was a petrol pump attendant. If you cannot remove your own bias on his profession on reading this, then read no further. If you can remove all prejudice against a man whom none of us knew, then read on. I think you will find this a perplexing case.

I have officially done more investigating than the Fayetteville Police Department and all from the comfort of my laptop, subsidised by a few phone calls.

The facts

Below is a list of undisputed facts on the Benoit double murder-suicide, collected from sources listed at the bottom.

• On Friday, Chris answered a call from friend Chavo Guerrero. While on the phone, Chavo said he heard what he describes as a “scuffle”. Chavo stayed on the line for almost 45 minutes. Chris returned to the phone sounding “groggy”. Chris told Chavo that he loved him which was very out of character for Benoit. Chris then hung up mid-sentence. Chavo’s returned calls went unanswered.

• Daniel’s autopsy suggests that he died during the time this call was made.

• Nancy’s autopsy showed that she probably died on Sunday.

• Chris’ body was so decomposed by the time he was found on Monday that experts believe that he may even have been dead on Friday night.

• Chris’ autopsy shows time of death at late Friday or early Saturday.

• High levels of Oxycodone and Xanax, strong sedatives, were found in the bodies of all three Benoits.

• There were no steroids in Chris Benoit’s body when he died.

• Chris was said to have hung himself on his gym equipment. His body was found on the ground under the equipment in a position you would have to manoeuvre into.

• There were bibles found beside each of the three bodies. The Benoits were not religious people and did not possess bibles.

• Benoit called WWE offices and said that he wouldn’t make Sunday’s show, Vengeance: Night of Champions. He claimed that he was feeling unwell and that both Daniel and Nancy were suffering from food poisoning. The lady that took the calls had worked with Chris for years. She did not recognise the voice on the phone. Chris had never had a sick day before.

• There was a white cloth wrapped around Chris’ neck when he was found.

• Chris sent several texts to friends and fellow wrestlers on Sunday evening, spelling out his address.

• There were 10 empty beer cans and an empty bottle of wine beside Chris’ body. There was no alcohol in Chris, Nancy or Daniel’s systems.

 

• A statement regarding Nancy Benoit's death was added to the Chris Benoit English Wikipedia article fourteen hours before police discovered the bodies of Benoit and his family. This seemingly prescient addition was initially reported on Wikinews and later on Fox News Channel. 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 12:01 a.m. EDT on June 25, whereas the Fayette County police reportedly discovered the bodies of the Benoit family at 2:30 p.m. EDT (14 hours, 29 minutes later). The IP address of the editor was traced to Stamford, Connecticut, which is also the location of WWE headquarters.

• The entire WWE locker room is said to have known of Nancy’s death on Sunday night.

• Police changed the location of where Nancy’s body was found on four occasions. The official location is unknown.

• Chris and Nancy told friends that they believed that they were being followed. For five weeks, Chris and Nancy had been taking an alternative route home.

• Nancy had been married to WCW wrestler and booker Kevin Sullivan.

• Nancy had an affair with Chris during their time in WCW.

• That weekend was the tenth anniversary of Nancy’s divorce from Kevin Sullivan.

• Sullivan had told Chris in front of several others that he would kill them and their kids when the time was right.

• The family received several death threats before their deaths.

• That weekend, Sherry Martel also died in her home under suspicious circumstances. She was a close friend of the Benoit family. She also had high levels of Oxycodone in her body when she died. Sherry was also an ex of Kevin Sullivan.

• Someone spent the entire weekend using Chris Benoit’s IM account, sending strange messages to WWE staff. One such message read “save me” and several others gave out his address.

• On Sunday morning, between 03:53 and 03:58, four text messages were sent from Chris’ phone and five from Nancy’s. They were both dead.

• The head of police said he saw needle marks on the bodies when the police were taking pictures. He said he saw no bibles near the bodies. Pictures show bibles near all three bodies and no needle marks can be seen. This story was later changed to match the pictures.

• There was no suicide note.

• Chris’ best friend Eddie Guerrero died in 2005. As a way of overcoming this tragedy, Chris kept a daily dairy on his thoughts and used it to ‘speak’ to Eddie. He never missed an entry. The police refused to release the details of Friday’s entry but did acknowledge that there were no entries for Saturday or Sunday.

• The police officially reported Daniel’s time of death as Saturday, before changing it to Friday.

• It was reported that Daniel suffered from Fragile X Syndrome. Police speculated that by murdering his son, Chris was putting him out of his misery. It later emerged that Daniel did not suffer from Fragile X Syndrome.

• Chris was later adjudged to be sedated at the time of his death.

• A large butcher’s knife, not belonging to the Benoits and with no fingerprints of any Benoits, was found near Daniel’s body.

• Daniel’s body had severe internal injuries in the neck and throat area. There were no external marks or abrasions, despite dying by strangulation, according to police.

• Nine text messages were sent from Chris’ phone on Monday that said “My physical address is…” The address was spelled incorrectly and Chris was already dead, for up three days, when these texts were sent out.

• Chris Benoit had no motive to kill his son, his wife or himself.

Unanswered questions

• Who called to the Benoit house on the Friday during the Chavo phone call?

• Who used the Benoits’ phones to send text messages after they were dead?

• Who used Chris’ IM account after he was dead?

• How did the WWE locker room know Nancy was dead before the police?

• Who called WWE, to ring in sick on Chris’ behalf, claiming to be Chris?

• Why were there empty drinks containers around the bodies yet no alcohol in the Benoits?

• Why are people blaming steroids and ‘roid rage? Roid rage occurs when someone abuses steroids and has bursts of uncontrollable rage. Studies show that these bursts occur days apart and for seconds at time. A weekend-long burst of rage makes no sense.

• When Nancy died, Chris was already dead. When Daniel died, Chris may have already been dead.

• Why didn’t the police question Kevin Sullivan? Where was Kevin Sullivan that weekend? In follow-up interviews by news outlets, he has refused to state his whereabouts on that weekend. The clean white cloth left on Chris, the clean blade by Daniel, Daniel’s internal damage despite no external marks, the sedation, the red wine with no fingerprints on it, the bibles beside the bodies of non-religious people – these are all circumstantially in line with satanic ritual. Kevin Sullivan is a known Satanist.

Sources

Michael Benoit (Chris’ father), Chavo Guerrero (friend of the family), Kevin Sullivan (Nancy’s ex-husband), state toxicology reports, all three autopsies, Fayette County District Attorney Scott Ballard, Scott Armstrong (Chris’ colleague), Christopher Nowinski (Chris’ colleague and concussion expert), Robert Holly (Chris’ colleague), Chris Irvine (Chris’ colleague and family friend), Wikipedia, WWE, Julian Bailes (head of neurosurgery at West Virginia University), Dr. Phil Astin (Benoit family physician), The Huffington Post, Irvin Muchnick, San Francisco Chronicle, Pro Wrestling Observer, Pro Wrestling Illustrated, Pro Wrestling Torch, The Washington Post, CNN, ericbischoff.com, Herald Sun, ABC News.