Tonya Harding: Still Sticking To Her Story, 15 Years After Nancy Kerrigan's Assault

Today, Oprah followed up on “big news stories from the ’90s.” Former U.S. Olympic figure skater Tonya Harding was on, still sticking to her story that her ex-husband’s friends attacked Nancy Kerrigan, without her knowledge.

As Oprah pointed out, it doesn’t make sense whatsoever that Harding’s ex-husband’s friends would injure Kerrigan in an attempt to make money as security guards. But after reading Harding’s Wikipedia page, I’ve learned that she might be a pathological liar, or at the very least, desperate for attention. Here are some choice passages:

In her 2008 autobiography, The Tonya Tapes, Harding said that she wanted to call the FBI to reveal what she knew [about Kerrigan’s attack], but refused when [her ex-husband Jeff] Gillooly allegedly threatened her with death following a gunpoint gang rape by Gillooly and two other men she did not know. Gillooly, who subsequently changed his name to Jeff Stone, called the allegations “utterly ridiculous.”

I really like this one a lot:

Skating magazine reported that at Skate America in 1991, Harding was stranded in heavy traffic just before her event was scheduled to begin, and had to hitch a ride with people who drove her backwards through traffic to the arena.

But it gets better:

On February 12, 1997, Harding claimed that she was abducted at knife-point outside her home by a bushy-haired man who forced her to drive to a rural area, where she rammed her truck into a tree and escaped by running into the woods. Police found no evidence of an abduction. This incident happened on the opening weekend of the 1997 U.S. Figure Skating Championships.

She loves telling the police that people attacked her:

On October 23, 2005, Harding, apparently again under the influence of alcohol, was involved in a fight at her home in Vancouver, Washington with Christopher Nolan, a man she described as her boyfriend. Initially, she made a 911 call claiming to have been assaulted in her home by two masked men.

This one is by far my fave:

On March 11, 2007, the Clark County sheriff’s office responded to two calls related to Harding. The first call was from Harding herself, at 5am. She told the officer who responded that she had observed five armed intruders trying to steal her vehicle, and hide rifles on her property. The responding officer’s report described her as “agitated” and her story as “very implausible,” and recorded her frustration that others could not see the people she saw. He could find no evidence to back up Harding’s claims. The second call, four hours later, at 9am, was from a friend who had agreed to let Harding visit. Harding’s host told police that although Harding was not violent, she was “tweaking out, seeing animals,” and she was worried about her children’s safety. She requested police return Harding to her home. Police reported that the officer who returned her home inspected her trailer home, to reassure her, and advised her to seek medical help.