This could be the most intimate moment Manti Te’o had with his “girlfriend.”
TMZ posted video of Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o awkwardly hugging Ronaiah Tuiasosopo on Nov. 24 after his Notre Dame team beat USC. Weeks later, Te’o would discover that Tuiasosopo was the one behind his non-existent, and recently deceased, girlfriend’s Twitter account.
Tuiasosopo and his cousins were allegedly the ones that not only fooled Te’o into thinking that Lennay Kekua was his girlfriend, but also spent hours on the phone with him to further the prank. In an interview with ESPN, Te’o said that Tuiasosopo admitted to him that he was behind the prank.
“Two guys and a girl are responsible for the whole thing,” Te’o told the Web site. “I don’t know (who they are). According to Ronaiah, Ronaiah’s one.”
WATCH: TE’O AND COURIC ON HIS PHONE CALLS WITH ‘LENNAY KEKUA’
Tuiasosopo has deleted his Twitter account and remained silent since Deadspin broke the story a week ago. Tuiasosopo has apparently tried to pull this prank on other people and athletes in the past, but none that went to his extent or gained this much notoriety.
For his part, Te’o said he did perpetuate the lie in an interview that will be aired in full with Katie Couric later today. After believing that Kekua had died from leukemia in September, he got a call from her claiming to still be alive and the person on the phone knew answers to questions that only she would know. That’s when Te’o began to become suspicious that she was fake.
“What would you do?” asked the 21-year-old Heisman Trophy runner-up. “I, my whole world told me that she died on Sept. 12. Everybody knew that. This girl, who I committed myself to, died.
“Now I get a phone call on December 6th, saying that she’s alive, and then I’m going be put on national TV two days later” for the Heisman ceremony.