Aired September 6, 2007 - 21:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

LARRY KING, HOST: Tonight new questions about what made wrestling superstar Chris Benoit snap.
Could brain damage from blows to the head be a factor in Benoit's strangling his wife and suffocating his 7-year-old son before hanging himself?

Now, Chris Benoit's father in his first live primetime interview on a disturbing new medical study of his son's brain, and on Chris's diary, which he found after the tragedy.

We welcome to LARRY KING LIVE Michael Benoit, the father of pro- wrestling star, Chris Benoit, who killed his wife and 7-year-old son before taking his own life during a weekend in late June.

Joined by Robert Cantu, chief of neurosurgery and director of sports medicine, Emerson College in -- Emerson Hospital in Concord, Mass. and co-director of the Neurological Sports Injury Center at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, and founding member of the Sports Legacy Institute.

How, Michael, are you coping?

MICHAEL BENOIT, FOUND SON CHRIS BENOIT'S DIARY AFTER CHRIS KILLED WIFE, SON & HIMSELF: It's been very difficult, Larry.

When something like this happens to your child -- I know Chris was a 40-year-old, but he is our son. We loved him very much. When it happened, we just couldn't understand that this was the Chris that we know and love.

KING: How did you hear about it?

BENOIT: Actually, it was through a reporter that used to be a friend of Chris'. I was on my way home from work. It was about 5:00 at night. It's one night that, for some reason, I didn't turn the radio on in my car, otherwise I would have picked the news up that way.

I was just about entering my driveway and my cell phone rang and it was my cousin in Ottawa.

And he said to me, "Mike, is it true?"

And before I could get the words out, the reporter came up to me and said, "He's gone."

KING: When you heard about the whole thing, how -- what do you tell yourself?

What do you -- we spoke on the phone shortly after that.

You were asking me how to explain to you -- how could I do that?

What do you tell yourself?

BENOIT: Larry, we were -- we were searching for answers. The world was so black. Not only did we lose our son, but we lost our daughter-in-law and our grandson. We -- we couldn't...

KING: How is your wife doing?

BENOIT: She's having a very difficult time.

KING: You're not doing well either, are you?

BENOIT: Well...

KING: How can you do well?

BENOIT: You know, I don't think that you ever recover from something like this. We're very fortunate, Larry. We have a daughter that's extremely strong and been very helpful to us.

KING: Now, Chris had two other children, right?

BENOIT: Yes.

KING: From another marriage?

BENOIT: Yes.

KING: They're how old?

BENOIT: Ten and 15. KING: And are they with their mother?

BENOIT: Yes.

KING: How are they doing?

BENOIT: Well, it's difficult to understand how a 10-year-old and a 15-year-old are actually coping with this. We're doing our best to explain to them the circumstances that -- their father's passing and, also, their stepbrother. It was absolutely overwhelming and continues to be, in our life.

KING: How soon before this had you spoken to your boy?

BENOIT: He phoned me on Father's Day.

KING: Which was how far...

BENOIT: The week -- the week before.

KING: Was he in good spirits?

BENOIT: He was. I asked him where he was and he said, "Unfortunately, I'm on the road today." He said, "It's Father's Day. I wish I was home with my wife and family.

KING: Was he a doting father?

BENOIT: Oh, he absolutely adored his children, absolutely adored his children. When he was coming off the road, he would phone us and I'd say, how you doing? And he'd say, really, really tired and his voice was sort of dragging.

And I'd say, how's Daniel and Nancy?

And right away he'd lighten right up and get right into it and tell us how well that they were doing.

KING: Tell me about the diary.

BENOIT: Well, the diary -- we found the diary after the fact. It was actually a neighbor of theirs that retrieved it from the trash. And this is a diary that he wrote over a period of about 10 days back in 2005, shortly after the death of his best friend in the wrestling business, Eddie Guerrero. After I read it -- it was very, very disturbing to me and I thought...

KING: Because?

BENOIT: The way he was writing it. There was a lot of...

KING: Was he depressed?

BENOIT: He seemed extremely depressed. And it's -- it was almost like he was sitting there talking to Eddie. And a lot of quotes out of the bible, which was out of character for Chris. KING: So we come to the conclusion that he snapped.

And did you -- did you -- what did you think it was?

Did you think it was drugs he was taking?

What did you guess?

BENOIT: I -- at that point, in time, we were completely overwhelmed. We didn't know what to think. You know, I liken it to being in the middle of this huge storm -- no light in the sky, just no way out.

What do you do?

KING: How did Dr. Cantu come into the picture?

BENOIT: Well, what happened was on the fourth day, I got a call from the chief medical examiner saying that they were releasing the body. And so I called the funeral parlor in Atlanta. I was going to have Chris' remains cremated and then brought home.

So I called the funeral parlor, made the arrangements and that afternoon -- Thursday afternoon -- I got a call from a fellow by the name of Chris Nowinski. Chris explained to me that he thought perhaps there might be brain damage there because of concussions that Chris would have suffered in the ring.

I was somewhat skeptical at first. I kept looking at the phone, looking for was it the "National Enquirer" calling?

Was it "The Globe?"

I -- you know, I was -- I really didn't know what to believe. But at least there was straws there that I was grasping at.

KING: Had an autopsy been done?

BENOIT: But we didn't have the results at that point in time.

KING: So you were going to cremate without the results -- before the...

BENOIT: Yes. Well, they...

KING: But the results would have been the same.

BENOIT: They had -- they had the tissues. The autopsy had already been completed. So we were just going to cremate.

KING: So you didn't cremate?

BENOIT: Well, what happened was, when Chris called me, he said -- he asked me for this and I said, "You know, you need to send me more information. I can't just tell you that it's OK to take my son's remains over the phone." So he sent me two articles that were in the "New York Post" and he also sent me a letter saying to sign off so that he could take the remains.

I called him back and said, "Chris, this really is incredible. There's no company name. There's nothing on here that would associate you with the Sports Legacy Institute. I said I could do it on my home computer. He said how about I give you some doctors' names that you can call?

And at that time, he gave me Dr. Cantu's name. He gave me Dr. Bales and he also gave me Dr. Kris Sperry, which -- who was the chief medical examiner for the State of Georgia.

KING: Let me get a break right there.

And when we come back, we'll bring Dr. Cantu in and get his summation as to what happened to Chris Benoit.

Dr. Gupta will join us later, as well.

Don't go away.

(VIDEO CLIP OF WRESTLING MATCH WITH CHRIS BENOIT)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And yes, Chris Benoit, (INAUDIBLE).

CHRIS JERICHO, FORMER WWE WRESTLER: This is not about steroids, Russ. This is about a man who had some severe mental, damaging, horrible issues in his head that he kept bottled up inside and it exploded into this horrible, violent act. And I'm sure there's many factors for it.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Benoit can damn sure weaken the 500-pounder.

JOHN CENA, WWE WRESTLER: What we have is an unexplainable tragedy.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh. Oh, no. Oh. Oh.

BRUNO SAMMARTINO, FORMER PRO WRESTLER: What's wrong with wrestling that it has all of these deaths?

All these deaths.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (INAUDIBLE). Finally!

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

KING: Michael Benoit remains with us now.

Robert Cantu, M.D. what's your summation here?

DR. ROBERT CANTU, SPORTS LEGACY INSTITUTE, EMERSON HOSPITAL NEUROSURGERY CHIEF: Well, Larry, prior to Chris Benoit's brain being examined by Sports Legacy Institute, four prior brains had been looked at and all four of them had chronic traumatic encephalopathy -- brain damage due to concussive and cumulative subconcussive brain injuries. All four of these were in National Football League players.

Chris Benoit's brain was similarly studied by the neuropathologist within the Sports Legacy Institute, Dr. Ben Omalu, with the special immunohistochemical stains that look for abnormal tile protein deposition.

KING: Break it down for me what you mean.

CANTU: Well, there is normal tile protein that all brain cells have and there is an abnormal form of it which occurs in certain neurodegenerative diseases and also occurs with brain damage due to brain trauma.

KING: So you're saying that a man who receives severe -- many concussions as a football player or a wrestler would -- could cause him to do something he would not normally do?

CANTU: Yes. The tile protein depositions in Chris Benoit's brain were far more extensive than in any other of the brains that the Sports Legacy Institute has examined.

KING: There's no way anyone could have then done something about this, right?

How would you have known?

CANTU: Well, the final definition clearly is a neuropathological definition, looking at immunohistochemical staining of the brain tissue. But any individual with a history of traumatic brain injuries -- especially multiple ones -- who exhibits behavior consistent with cognitive impairment, depression and erratic emotional behavior -- that's kind of a triad that fits with chronic traumatic encephalothopy and then he...

KING: And, therefore, something could have been done?

CANTU: It would lead one to suspect the problem and hopefully pull one away from the activities that would lead to progressive damage.

KING: Stop wrestling?

CANTU: Yes, in this case.

KING: Does this at all satisfy you, Michael?

BENOIT: Well, we now have an understanding of why, because the Chris Benoit that we knew was incapable of doing this. The man that we loved, the man that was our son, would never do this. I mean he talked of his love for his wife and his children.

How could this possibly happen? KING: Did you ever buy the stories about steroids?

BENOIT: Well, steroids themselves are pretty rampant in sports today -- pro-football, baseball, track and field, the Tour de France. We're hearing it all the time.

The difference that -- between professional wrestling and these sporting events is that in professional wrestling, the outcome is -- it's scripted.

KING: Right.

BENOIT: So, in other words, they script who's going to win. So the wrestlers aren't cheating. And I'll give you an example of -- my description of steroids is that his mom had read an article about tanning booths one time, phoned Chris up and said they're very dangerous, why are you doing this?

And he said mom, I can't go in the ring looking like a plucked chicken.

So steroids were being taken for the look.

KING: Can steroids, doctor, cause someone to do like what Chris did?

CANTU: I think there's significant debate within the medical community about that, whether steroid rage really exists. And I realize here we're dealing with actions over a three-day period that clearly were not just rage reactions. There was deliberation that went on, at least for part of it.

There -- most importantly, Larry, there is no evidence in the medical literature or science to suggest that the steroids lead to the traumatic encephalopathy brain damage changes that were present in Chris's brain.

KING: So severe brain damage as could occur from constant concussions in wrestling can cause someone to do something horrific?

CANTU: Yes. Four out of -- three out of the other four cases committed suicide.

KING: The NFL players?

BENOIT: Yes.

KING: LARRY KING LIVE asked the WWE, the wrestling organization, for a statement in connection with tonight's discussion of the findings about Chris Benoit's brain tissue.

This is what they said.

The WWE referred us to a statement the organization issued on Tuesday. It reads: "Today's attempt to explain Chris Benoit's murder of his family was possibly caused by some form of dementia as a result of alleged concussions is speculative. WWE can certainly understand the anguish of a father having to deal with the fact that his son allegedly murdered his wife and young son, as Chris Benoit is alleged to have done. We respect the desire of the father to do whatever he can to find some explanation as to why his son might commit such horrible acts."

When we come back, our CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta, a practicing neurosurgeon, joins us.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

TED DIBIASE, FORMER WWE WRESTLER: Nothing about Chris Benoit's character says that he was capable of doing this. I mean he was a man's man. He was a stand up guy. He was a guy that all of the other wrestlers looked up to and admired.

JERICHO: If you lined up a thousand guys and said which guy would do this, he would be the last guy that I would guess.

BRET HART, FORMER PRO WRESTLER: You know, maybe one of those kind of guys that everybody would lean on. This was a guy that was really loved by the industry. He was loved by the fans. Everyone would have reached out and helped this guy and maybe tried to change this from ever happening.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK

KING: We're back with Michael Benoit, the father of the late Chris Benoit and, of course, his grandson and daughter-in-law killed, as well.

And Dr. Robert Cantu.

We're joined now, also, across the way in our studios, Dr. Sanjay Gupta, himself a neurosurgeon and CNN's chief medical correspondent, who's been following this story.

What more can you tell us, Sanjay?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Well, sometimes, Larry, a picture is worth a thousand words. And Dr. Cantu was sort referring to this.

we got a very unusual glimpse here. You know, oftentimes we don't get this sort of detail after someone has passed on, to get a chance to look at their brain. And then maybe I can explain a little bit about what you've been talking about this.

Larry, look over here. This is a normal brain. Take a look at some the cells here. You just see the normal borders around these cells. That's what a normal brain looks like under the microscope when you do a pathological examination. What Dr. Cantu has been talking about here -- and this is Chris Benoit's brain, a piece of it -- and they actually are looking at these specific deposits of protein. And, I think, Larry, even to the untrained eye, people can see that these are unusual. These are different. And these are the deposits of this tile protein that seems to be of such significance here.

When you get deposits like this, several things happen. It can approximate someone having dementia, someone having memory loss, someone having behavioral changes. Again, you might expect these sort of changes in someone of advanced age who had Alzheimer's Disease or some sort of dementia like that, but we're talking about a 40-year-old man.

So I thought maybe just showing these pictures like this, Larry...

KING: Yes, that's great.

GUPTA: ...might tell you what -- give you a little of the story.

KING: Dr. Gupta, do you buy the theory that someone, through constant brain concussions, having a brain like that, could cause the horrific acts that Chris caused?

GUPTA: I don't know, Larry. It's that -- establishing that cause and effect relationship -- I guess I'm not prepared to say that for sure.

We do know several things, though. We know, for example, concussions to the brain become exponentially worse. So while one concussion is bad, a second concussion is exponentially worse, a third concussion and so on. So, as you -- as you get more and more concussions throughout your life, you can cause significant brain abnormalities.

And we also know that we're starting to get emerging evidence about what that does to your brain. Larry, in the 1920s -- you may have heard of it. They called it Punch Drunk Syndrome, from boxers, right?

KING: Um-hmm.

GUPTA: And it was the same thing. We just didn't know what it was, exactly. We couldn't look at it in this level of detail.

But to take that and put it to the next step about this cause and effect relationship -- the cause being this, the effect being violent, vicious behavior -- I think it's very hard to establish that still.

KING: Are you open to the possibility?

GUPTA: Yes, I think we're open to the possibility. And, you know, Dr.

Cantu is referring to five patients now that have been studied who, as a result of these concussions, have had depression. They've had marital problems. They've had financial problems. Some have committed suicide.

So we're starting to be able to recognize something that really hasn't been recognized before.

Alzheimer's, for example, is a recognized condition.

Could this be a recognized condition that is just starting to emerge and the scientific evidence is building?

Perhaps. I don't know that we're quite there yet, though, Larry.

KING: Do you have any questions for Dr. Cantu?

GUPTA: Dr. Cantu, one of the questions I had, you know, we talk a lot about this looking like the brain of an Alzheimer's person.

Are you surprised, with all your work that you've done, that Chris Benoit didn't have more symptoms that might resemble dementia prior to what happened?

CANTU: Well, Sanjay, as a fellow neurosurgeon, thank you for your comments.

GUPTA: Thank you.

CANTU: I certainly am interested.

With regard to the symptoms Chris did or didn't have, I don't think tonight we have all the answers to that. The diary is certainly suggesting -- and the diary antedates his death by almost two years -- that symptoms and erratic behavior were being experienced some years before. There's other evidence that we have seen that suggests that he's had cognitive difficulties, as well.

So I don't really think his problems came about just at the end. I think there is a track record that goes back several years. And as it's more exhaustively studied, it may actually go back more than two years.

KING: Sanjay, I guess you can certainly understand Michael's desire to put a close to this.

GUPTA: Yes, absolutely. And, you know, I think that, obviously, you want to be as accurate as possible. And, you know, and what we're looking at is the brain of a 40-year-old man that obviously is very abnormal. And, most likely, this is not due to steroids, as I think Michael -- Mr. Benoit -- sort of alluded to. This is most likely due -- based on everything we know -- due to those repeated concussions. And something clearly happened in his brain and you can see it very clearly here, Michael.

KING: Should wrestlers, pro-football players and others who deal with this be looked at more often, Sanjay?

GUPTA: I think so. And this is something that we've done quite a few stories on.

As you know, Larry, I would say not only should they be looked at more, but they probably should be looked at at the time of the injury and maybe even be grounded or kept off the field or kept out of the ring maybe more diligently.

A first concussion, as quickly as someone may recover from that and actually get back to the level of play, what has happened to their brain at that point?

And what will happen to their brain if they have a second concussion?

We know now -- and I think Dr.

Cantu would agree with this -- that it's exponentially worse. So we've really got to be diligent as doctors, as trainers, as people who help monitor this sort of thing, whether or not we should let these players back on the field.

KING: Obviously, Dr. Cantu, looking at what we're looking at there, it can't be beneficial to your health.

CANTU: No, not at all. And I think...

KING: Hitting a board with your head.

CANTU: And I think what you also saw there was the neck being snapped very violently.

KING: Yes.

CANTU: The head, it's -- at the end of it, concussive blows can be imparted by whiplash.

KING: Did you like the fact that your son wrestled, Michael?

BENOIT: That was my son's passion. He loved to wrestle. What bothered me about the wrestling industry was the extremes that they went to. Wrestling is a work and a work means that it's an illusion. What you see in the ring is really not happening. People aren't killing themselves in the ring. But once they introduce the chairs, the ladders, the tables, this is real.

I once asked my son, I said, "When you get hit with a chair, does it hurt?

He said, "You're damn right it hurts, dad."

So...

KING: Yes. You look at it and it seems crazy.

Thank you, Michael.

BENOIT: Well, thanks. KING: The best of luck to you.

We'll be talking to you again.

BENOIT: Thanks so much.

KING: Dr. Cantu.

Sanjay, thanks for joining in on this.

GUPTA: Thanks, sir.

KING: And thanks for that look at -- the look at the brain. I've never seen anything like that.

You have our deepest sympathies, Michael.

BENOIT: Well, Thank you.