Manti Te'o hoaxer "fell deeply, romantically in love" with football star, Dr. Phil says
The man behind the Manti Te'o girlfriend hoax "fell deeply, romantically in love " with the star Notre Dame linebacker, according to Dr. Phil McGraw who recently interviewed Ronaiah Tuiasosopo.
"Here we have a young man that fell deeply, romantically in love," McGraw told NBC's Mike Taibbi. "I asked him straight up, 'Was this a romantic relationship with you?' And he says yes. I said, 'Are you then therefore gay?' And he said, 'When you put it that way, yes.' And then he caught himself and said, 'I am confused.'"
The two-part interview will air Thursday and Friday on McGraw's nationally syndicated show, Dr. Phil. According to NBC, Tuiasosopo told Dr. Phil that Te'o was an innocent victim of his elaborate hoax, in which the 22-year-old from California created a woman, named Lennay Kekua, who then supposedly died last September. The ruse was uncovered last week by Deadspin.com.
"I wanted to end it because, after everything I had gone through, I finally realized that I just had to move on with my life," Tuiasosopo told McGraw. "I had to start just living and let this go. There were many times where Manti and Lennay had broken up, but something would bring them back together whether it was something going on in his life or in Lennay's life, or in this case, my life."
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Last week, Te'o told Katie Couric that he briefly lied about his online girlfriend after discovering she didn't exist, while maintaining that he had no part in creating the hoax. Te'o told Couric that he was told about the hoax on Dec. 6 but chose to wait to discuss it until after the BCS National Championship Game on Jan. 7 out of embarrassment.