Matt Riddle was released by the WWE on September 22nd, but cases surrounding him are still doing the rounds. ‘The Original Bro’ was accused of sexual assault and sexual behaviour towards her female counterparts during his time in the independent circuit.
In 2020, on June 19th, Indiana-based wrestler Thunderkitty tweeted and later deleted her tweet about allegations against Matt Riddle. She wasn’t the only one who complained of bad behaviour from the former WWE Tag Team Champion, as many others joined the list who complained about his misconduct.
According to the details shared by Fightful, Malia Hosaka talked about her bad experience when David Bixnespan looked into the allegations and approached her for comment via Facebook Messenger.
We were all in there, our show was going on. I didn’t know who he was, but I was sitting with my feet propped up and eyes closed. When I opened them[,] he was on my right stripped down to his underwear and I got mad at the lack of respect from today’s generation. For him to come into the locker room to change while the women had the room[,] and to strip down and change was disrespectful. There was a bathroom down the hall that fans couldn’t get to that he could have used. [In m]y generation[,] the men and women respected each other enough to at least ask if it was ok or to ask for privacy. It pissed me off[,] and then his attitude that he had underwear on and that it wasn’t a big deal pissed me off more[,] so I told him how I felt about the lack of respect.
Riddle considered the incident as something that was blown out of proportion because according to him, this situation happened as there was only one locker room.
The PWX thing wasn’t even an incident[.] [T]here was only one locker room (which isn’t uncommon on the indies unfortunately) [and] the promoter told me to change in there[,] so I did. Malia confronted me on my way out, I explained that the promoter told me to go change in there and she talked to the promoter and that was the end of it.
Riddle put things on the promoter, but Bix seems to have received different word about this incident from others who work independent shows. There was another incident involving Candy Cartwright where she claimed that during her trip in the van, Riddle sexually assaulted her. The driver to the van was “Abby the Butcher”. Riddle responded to it stating:
In regards to my friend Abby driving the van, he’s driven me and others on multiple occasions/loops in the north east [sic] when I was on the indies [and] even in WWE,” wrote Riddle when asked for comment. (“Abby” didn’t respond to tweets asking about it.) “[W]hen he realized she was talking about a different van ride/loop in the Midwest[,] he realized it and took his tweet down.
Samantha Tavel (Candy Cartwright’s real name) filed a lawsuit against EVOLVE Wrestling, Gabe Sapolsky, Riddle, and World Wrestling Entertainment, seeking 10 million dollars from each defendant. She did this after calling out Riddle in the Speaking Out movement.
The lawsuit alleged that Riddle started sexually assaulting Tavel in the parking lot after the Evolve wrestling event in April 2017. The lawsuit also had Sapolsky and WWE as part of it, but their names were removed in March 2021. The lawsuit against Riddle was dropped sometime eventually later.
Coming soon 🤙 pic.twitter.com/4p3y4yTKt8
— matthew riddle (@SuperKingofBros) September 28, 2023
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