THE FINAL WORD ON THE CHRIS BENOIT FAMILY TRAGEDY

THE FINAL WORD ON THE CHRIS BENOIT
FAMILY TRAGEDY
WITH NEVER BEFORE HEARD POLICE AUDIO

Over a three-day period between June 22 and 24, 2007, Chris Benoit, a 40-year-old Canadian professional wrestler employed by World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE), murdered his wife Nancy and their seven-year-old son, Daniel, before hanging himself at their residence in Fayetteville, Georgia, United States. Autopsy results showed that Benoit's wife was murdered first, having died of asphyxiation on the night of June 22.^[1]

Daniel, who also died of asphyxia, was killed as he was lying sedated in his bed on the morning of June 23. On the evening of June 24, Benoit died by suicide in his weight room, when he used his lat pulldown machine to hang himself. He placed Bibles near the bodies of his wife and son.^[2][3] Since the tragedy, numerous explanations for Benoit's actions have been proposed, including severe chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE)^[4] and steroid and alcohol abuse,^[5] leading to a failing marriage and other personal problems.^[6] This led to numerous media accounts, and a federal investigation into steroid abuse in professional wrestling

Murder of Nancy Benoi

On Friday, June 22, 2007, Chris Benoit killed his wife Nancy in the bonus room of their house in Fayetteville, Georgia, 22 miles south of Atlanta. According to the police report, Nancy's limbs were bound prior to her death, with her arms being restrained with coaxial cables, and her feet being duct-taped together. A balled-up combination of a tube sock and tape was also found in the kitchen trash and appeared to be soaked in dried blood, which led police to believe that it was being used as a makeshift gag prior to Nancy's death. Her body was found wrapped in a blanket alongside a Bible. Injuries indicated that Benoit had pressed a knee into her back while pulling on a cord around her neck, causing strangulation. Officials said that there were no signs of immediate struggle.^[7]

Toxicologists found alcohol in Nancy's body, but were unable to determine whether it had been present before death or was a product of decomposition. Decomposition made it difficult to estimate pre-death levels of hydrocodone and alprazolam, which were found in "therapeutic levels" in her body. In any case, the medical examiner saw no evidence that Nancy was as sedated as her son had been when he was killed.^[8]

Murder of Daniel Benoit

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Daniel Christopher Benoit (February 25, 2000 – June 23, 2007) was Chris' third child and second son. He had older paternal half-siblings, David (born 1993) and Megan (born 1997) via Chris's first wife, Martina, who were all living in Canada at the time the murder-suicide took place. He was Nancy's only child, as she had no children with her ex-husbands Jim Daus or Kevin Sullivan.^{[citation needed]}

Daniel was suffocated and killed in his bedroom, and another Bible was left by his body.^[9] He had internal injuries to the throat area, showing no bruises.^[10] Daniel's exact time of death is unknown.^[11] The reports determined Daniel was sedated with Xanax and likely unconscious when he was killed.^[12][13] His body had just started to show signs of decomposition but was not as far along as his mother's body.^[8]

It was later alleged that Daniel had the genetic disorder fragile X syndrome and that this was the cause of domestic problems in the Benoit family.^[14] It was also suggested that track marks on Daniel's arms were the result of human growth hormone (HGH) injections because Benoit and his family considered him undersized due to his condition.^[15] Benoit's coworker and close friend, wrestler Chris Jericho, stated that from his own research on the condition, the symptoms "fit Daniel to a tee, all across the board". Concerning those who had publicly stated that 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."^[16] Despite 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."^[17]

District Attorney Scott 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's teachers reported that he was on par with other students and not about to be held back as previously thought.^[18] In 2016, speaking publicly for the first time in a major public interview on a Talk is Jericho podcast, Nancy's sister, Sandra Toffoloni, unequivocally denied any claims that Daniel had ever had fragile X or any similar condition. She also stated that claims of needle track marks on Daniel's arms were "preposterous".^[19]

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