“Chris went nuts”, says WWE CEO on the brutal double murder-suicide committed by his esteemed performer
Chris Benoit, nicknamed The Rabid Wolverine, was once one of the most beloved wrestlers in the WWE. He was a former world champion, a Wrestlemania main eventer and a Royal Rumble winner.
But in June 2007, he did the unthinkable. On the night he was supposed to win a third world championship, he killed his wife, his 7-year-old son and then himself at their family home.
Following the tragedy, Benoit was scrubbed from the company’s memory, with his name being wiped from the website, video games, press releases and DVDs. His name was almost never uttered on air.
In 2024, disgraced former WWE CEO Vince McMahon finally addressed the double murder-suicide as part of Netflix ‘s six-part docu-series, Mr McMahon.
Chris Benoit, who was 40 years old at the time of his death, had been wrestling since the age of 18 and had competed in promotions across the world, including in the US, Canada and Japan.
He held 30 championships during his career and has been called one of the best technical wrestlers in history.
After his death, the neuroscientist and former WWE wrestler Christopher Nowinski argued that Benoit may have suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or CTE, a neurodegenerative disease caused by repeated trauma to the head.
CTE can cause extreme mood swings and behavioural issues. It is also common among American football players and was established as a factor in the murder of Odin Lloyd by former NFL star Aaron Hernandez in 2013. OJ Simpson told close ones before his death he believed he suffered from CTE.
Tests on Benoit’s brain by West Virginia University after his death concluded that: “Benoit’s brain was so severely damaged it resembled the brain of an 85-year-old Alzheimer’s patient.”
Steroids were also found in Benoit’s home after the murders, leaving some to believe the deaths may have been caused by “roid rage”.
Talking to Netflix, McMahon dismissed these rumours: “There’s no correlation between taking steroids and what happened to Chris Benoit, human beings are flawed. Chris went nuts, it happens in every form of life, that’s the only thing I can take away from it.
Vince McMahon and the WWE had previously been involved in a major steroid scandal in the 1990s, in which the US government accused McMahon of illegally supplying anabolic steroids to its performers. McMahon was ultimately found not guilty.
McMahon added: “This doctor came up with this ridiculous statement of ‘Okay here’s why Chris Benoit did this.’ There was some sort of trauma to his head and things were shown where Chris would dive off the rope and hit someone with his head. That’s a complete work. It looks like there’s damage and there’s not. We know what we’re doing, we don’t hurt each other.”
The Netflix series also featured legendary wrestler Stone Cold Steve Austin asserting that he “didn’t believe” in “all that CTE stuff”.
Elsewhere in the documentary, McMahon says: “Chris Benoit was thought of as an excellent in-ring performer. And as far as we knew, a great guy.”
The WWE maintains that it has robust concussion and drug-test protocols and holds it had no responsibility for Chris Benoit’s actions.
