All Elite Wrestling is currently tangled in a massive game of he said, she said. Following AEW All Out on Sunday, former AEW World Champion CM Punk used his press conference to blast numerous members of the AEW roster as well as top executives in the company. Those top executives, AEW Executive Vice Presidents Kenny Omega and the Young Bucks, took exception to Punk’s comments and confronted him in his locker room after the presser. This led to a physical altercation between the two parties, which culminated in a chair being thrown at Nick Jackson and Omega being bitten by Punk’s trainer, Ace Steel.
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Since this backstage fight went down, numerous reports have surfaced regarding details from both sides. Sources close to Punk claim that the Bucks forced their way into the locker room, while sources from The Elite’s side say they simply opened the door. One side says Punk felt threatened by the three men, while the other says he began throwing punches without reason.
The strongly different recollections have forced AEW to hire a independent company to conduct an investigation into what actually went down. This will be accomplished via interviews with everyone that was involved, either as a participant or a witness. Based on reports, this includes Punk, Steel, Omega, the Bucks, Christopher Daniels, Michael Nakazawa, Pat Buck, and Brandon Cutler.
A new report from Dave Meltzer of the Wrestling Observer Newsletter revealed two new names that are believed to have witnessed the altercation: AEW Chief Legal Officer Megha Parekh and AEW talent Maxwell Jacob Friedman.
“The company has brought in an independent firm to investigate and do video interviews with everyone in the room, which included all the names mentioned above, as well as many others, including a number of neutral parties who were in the room and were believed to have seen everything as it happened,” Meltzer said. “The key names that would have included were Max ‘MJF’ Friedman and AEW and Jacksonville Jaguars Chief Legal Officer Megha Parekh.”
Meltzer then confirmed that all nine men involved will remain suspended until the investigation is complete.
“Until the investigation is completed those involved in the fracas were suspended. All long-term decisions regarding anything to do with any of them are pending until completion of the investigation,” Meltzer said. “There still could be outside legal proceedings regarding the fight from different sides. I don’t expect AEW to ever address the specifics of what happened. Depending on the timing or threats of legal action, we don’t know if the key parties will talk. It is believed some want to talk and tell their side of the story when they can.”
The report concluded by noting that while the parties involved have significantly different recounts, the key witnesses’ stories line up much more. AEW has not commented on the situation “due to legal reasons.”
