Independent wrestler Terra Calaway has revealed through her Twitter account a personal story she witnessed while attending a seminar that was coached by current NXT Head Trainer Bill DeMott.
This follows a week’s worth of stories about the allegedly abusive training style and behavior of DeMott, in part due to now former talent Judas Draven releasing a letter that he wrote to corporate while employed, pleading with them to do something about the situation.
The issues originated years ago, with a large spotlight being brought upon the WWE, who ultimately claimed they found no wrongdoing within their company.
Through the new accusations (viewable here and here) brought upon by Draven, however, DeMott has been accused of various actions, including, but not limited to:
- Telling a talent he hopes he dies.
- Referring to a talent as a pedophile.
- Slapping a talent in the face and proceeding to drop them on their head/neck region to display the incorrect form of executing a bodyslam.
- Kicking a talent in the groin and laughing as he collapses.
- Slapping a talent’s concussed head.
- Utilizing dangerous drills that could cause unneeded injury, such as forcing a talent to balance on the top turnbuckle as another runs off the ring ropes.
- Whipping ring ropes along the bridge of talents’ noses as a punishment.
- Carrying a gun in his desk.
- Kicking a talent with a broken leg in his medical boot.
- Using homophobic, derogatory terms to insult talent.
A past allegation against DeMott also included a weekly tradition he would do while leading developmental territory, Deep South Wrestling. Allegedly, he offered talent the day off of training if they got inside the ring naked, stuck a jelly donut in their butt and forced another naked wrestler to take it from them with their mouth while seated in a stinkface position.
Draven’s claims listed above have since been backed up and/or added to by fellow wrestlers Trent Barreta, Ethan Carter, Briley Pierce, Joey Ryan, Brandon Traven, Kevin Matthews, Chase Donovan, Chad Baxter and James Bronson, all of whom have either been signed for a period of time or attended tryouts and have experienced some form of training under DeMott.
Matthews also posted a tweet years ago, stating DeMott forced then developmental Diva Angelina Love to do countless drills until she snapped her patella tendon and was out for nine months. In addition, a friend of another former talent also recently came forward, claiming the experience changed him for the worse, and former Superstar, Hardcore Holly, tweeted that he was told identical stories as the ones mentioned above about DeMott from two former NXT talents who attended a seminar he taught.
Late last night, though, Terra Calaway became the first woman to publicly speak up, as she posted a series of tweets that unveiled a scenario in which she was a witness to DeMott displaying a series of offensive and racist comments to a fellow competitor of Middle Eastern descent:
As someone who has been bullied my entire childhood and even more so now as an adult, I stand behind those who do something about it. Who…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… Fight for it to end. That being said, I know I am putting myself in a situation and I know it will have effects, but I cannot keep…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… quiet. At a training seminar, where students paid $100 a person to be in the ring and learn, I witnessed DeMott call a Middle…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… Eastern trainee "Aladdin", "terrorist", and "fat fuck" multiple times. During a bump drill that was nowhere near safe for a green…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… trainee to be doing, he just embarrassed and humiliated him. When anyone else did the drill correctly, he'd turn to this guy and just…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… bash him. When I did the drill, he said "Look even the girl can bump better than the terrorist!". This continued to the end of…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… the session where he told everyone good job, except this guy, and told him to "fucking quit and go back to building bombs." It was…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… completely uncalled for and made everyone uncomfortable. This guy spent his hard earned money to learn from someone, to get better…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… only to be told to quit and have all these names and insults thrown at him. I have been, and continue to be, bullied and I cannot…
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
… just keep quiet when the world is finally trying to do something about it. To fix it. To save lives.
— Terra Calaway (@TerraCalaway) March 6, 2015
In response to comments originating early this week, WWE issued the following statement:
“WWE took the accusations made two years ago by Austin Matelson very seriously, conducted a full investigation and was unable to validate the claims. Regardless, WWE continues to reinforce policies and procedures to ensure a positive training environment.”
However, the names involved with said incidents have gone on record stating that, still to this day, they were never contacted. They add that the aforementioned investigation involved questioning contracted talent that were not able to speak up in fear of losing their jobs.
Regardless of the stance one takes on wrestling training methods, a publicly traded company that prides itself in anti-bullying and has founded the “Be A Star” campaign (which promotes a positive environment for all, regardless of age, race, religion or sexual orientation) must surely see this as a dilemma, especially considering this is not the first time accusations and negative press against DeMott have risen to the public eye since his second tenure began.
