Retired WWE pro wrestler Lance Storm weighed in on “disgusting” claims that Vince McMahon sexually abused a female staffer, including with sex toys that he named after wrestling stars, per a bombshell lawsuit filed Thursday.
“Look, I used to be considered one of the few that said he needed to be gone when the story first broke,” Storm said of a Wall Street Journal report from 2022, when it was first revealed WWE was investigating payouts to multiple women who had alleged sexual misconduct.
McMahon had briefly retired as WWE’s chairman and CEO in July 2022, but returned as the chief chairman of TKO Group Holdings, WWE’s parent company, in January 2023.
“I used to be outspoken against him being allowed back within the office, being allowed back in shows,” Storm told “Wrestling Observer Live” co-host Bryan Alvarez on Thursday, adding that he boycott WWE programming upon McMahon’s return to an executive role in 2023.
“That’s classic sexual predator stuff — find someone down on their luck and begin grooming them and bending them to your will,” Storm added of the explosive lawsuit filed in Connecticut federal court this week, which names considered one of the ladies that allegedly received a payout from McMahon.
Janel Grant broke her silence within the court documents, which revealed that McMahon’s use of sex toys on her caused injuries comparable to bruising and bleeding.
In one other shocking incident, the wrestling magnate allegedly defecated on Grant’s head during a threesome in May 2020, and sex trafficked her to other WWE executives, per the grievance.
“This is totally disgustingly horrible and he must be gone and done, and I hope there’s criminal charges brought if any of that is even remotely true,” Storm said.
“With there being so many NDAs [non-disclosure agreements] and an extended list of things, I can’t fathom the way it isn’t,” added 54-year-old Storm, who retired from the ring in 2004.
In light of the allegations, Storm — who now works as a producer for TNA Wrestling — added that “he [McMahon] be booted off the board, take his keys to the office away [and] bar him from going to the shows.”
“I feel there must be a legitimate cleansing of house of anyone who covered anything up, who knew about this.”
John Laurinaitis, WWE’s former head of talent relations, is known as as a defendant within the lawsuit after allegedly being recruited by McMahon to have sex with Grant.
Grant was told by McMahon to go to Laurinaitis in his hotel rooms where she had sex with him before workdays, per the lawsuit.
In one other encounter at WWE headquarters in Stamford, Conn., in June 2021, McMahon and Laurinaitis forced themselves on her and took turns restraining her for the opposite, it was alleged within the lawsuit.
“No means yes” and “Take it, b—h” were among the many things McMahon and Laurinaitis said to Grant through the alleged assault, the court documents state.
Despite allegations of sexual misconduct involving McMahon going back at the least three years, the WWE has said in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission that while government investigations into McMahon remain ongoing, no charges have been brought.
And though WWE formed a “special committee” to review allegations against McMahon in 2022, it was concluded by November of that yr.
McMahon said in a press release on the time: “Throughout this experience, I actually have at all times denied any intentional wrongdoing and proceed to achieve this. I’m confident that the federal government’s investigation will probably be resolved with none findings of wrongdoing.”
Users on social media, nevertheless, don’t seem as convinced.
In response to Storm’s comments on the wrestling news-focused radio show, many agreed that “Vince gotta go.”
“Vince is a dam sick monster. Get him gone now!” one other wrote, while a user by the name of Matt Cruz warned that “it’s rather a lot easier said than done to eliminate everyone.”
“Vince is so powerful, those who’re complicit could easily say they were forced or risk losing their livelihood,” Cruz cautioned.