Hack-Man Pro-Wrestling Sable Tragedy Page

Last updated 4 July 2004


Sable Tragedy -- Hubby Killed Himself And 3 Others

By The National Enquirer

Heartbreak haunts wrestling beauty. . .

Sexy women's wrestling champion Sable has a heartbreaking, tragic past -- her first husband killed himself and three others in a boozy stupor.

Sable has shot to stardom recently as one of pro wrestling's top draws and a magazine cover girl. Yet little more than seven years ago, she lived through one of the most horrifying nightmares imaginable.

On Oct. 19, 1991, her hubby and first love Wayne Richardson crashed his best friend's Chevy Blazer into a concrete pole. Wayne and two buddies died instantly -- and another died in the hospital a few days later.

Shortly after the crash, police determined that Wayne was legally drunk -- with a blood alcohol level of .22, far above the legal limit.

Wayne and his pals had spent part of the night drinking tequila together at the home of Teresa and Beau Holden. They helped Wayne drown his sorrows over a fight with his 23-year-old wife -- Rena Richardson, as Sable was known back then.

Wayne and Rena argued bitterly early that night about Wayne's drinking and carousing!

Rena wanted him to stay home with her and their daughter Mariah, then 3 years old. But he wanted to go out boozing and shooting the breeze with his buddies instead.

"Wayne was a wild-eyed Southern boy," Wayne's good friend Walter "Bubba" Smith told The ENQUIRER.

"He didn't mess around with women. Wayne was a good provider, worked hard Monday through Friday -- but come the weekend he loved to party," said Bubba.

Wayne's mother, Pat Bugg, warned her son about his wild ways, she told a reporter at the time of the crash. "The last time I saw him, I told him he had a beautiful wife and daughter and he didn't need to be out. But children never listen to their mother."

Ironically, one of the four pals who piled into Beau Holden's Blazer that fateful night -- Leland Clayton -- was sober as a judge.

"Leland hadn't even been drinking!" recalled Teresa Holden.

"Wayne was the drunkest one in the car, yet he took the wheel," Teresa told The ENQUIRER. The crash left her a widow with two young boys, ages 6 and 8, to raise alone.

"Why did Wayne get behind the wheel? Why didn't Lee drive? Why? Why? Why?" she agonized.

While the crash devastated four families, Rena suffered most, said Teresa.

"Wayne was over at our house, calling her. But she wouldn't pick up the phone. He kept pleading, ‘Please answer, honey, please talk to me. I love you,'" into the answering machine. But she never did.

"The next phone call Rena got that night was from the Florida Highway Patrol telling her that her husband was dead!" Teresa declared.

"So when this happened the way it did, she was faced for the rest of her life with the haunting knowledge that Wayne died without her forgiveness and understanding.

"It just tore her heart out.

"The day after the accident, she just sobbed and sobbed for hours. She was inconsolable. She tortured herself, saying, ‘I didn't get to say goodbye. Mariah didn't get to say goodbye to her daddy,'" added Teresa.

Brokenhearted Rena couldn't face ever going back to the trailer she and Wayne had called home, said her former mother-in-law.

"Rena and little Mariah moved in with me right after the accident," Wayne's mother, Pat Bugg, told The ENQUIRER.

"They stayed with me about 10 months. Rena was just devastated. We all were. We helped each other through the heartache and pain."

Even though Rena and Wayne fought the night he died, they had a solid marriage, said Teresa.

"Wayne was her whole life, her entire universe," said Teresa. "She worshiped the ground he walked on.

"They were head over heels in love with each other," added Teresa.

Wayne was faithful Rena's first love. They met when she was only 15 -- and still went by her birth name, Rena Greek.

They married in 1987, when she was 19. "And they were blissfully happy," added Teresa.

After Wayne's death, Rena grieved but grew stronger.

"It was the death of her beloved Wayne that inspired Rena to reach for the stars," Teresa declared.

"I saw her turn despair into determination.

"We all know she's a strong woman on the outside but what many people don't know about Rena is her incredible strength of character on the inside. She's got true grit."

Not long after Wayne's death, strong-willed Rena picked up the pieces of her life and began modeling again, said Teresa -- and met her future husband, pro wrestler Marc Mero.

"Rena was doing fashion shows modeling bathing suits. She always had a beautiful figure. Marc spotted her in the mall one day when he was in town for a wrestling match. He approached her. I think the sparks flew instantly," said Teresa.

Even though the attraction was mutual, Rena wasn't over her grief yet, according to Pat.

"It was just too soon after Wayne's death and she couldn't pursue it," Pat explained.

But in 1993, Marc and Rena began dating and married soon after.

"Right after they were married, Marc adopted Mariah," said proud Pat Bugg, who's happy for her former daughter-in-law and ecstatic for her granddaughter.

"Mariah says she has a daddy in heaven and a daddy on earth. She's a beautiful little girl. I know Wayne lives on through his little girl," added Pat.

Today, as Sable, Rena is one of the World Wrestling Federation's top draws.

Earlier this year, Sable posed for Playboy -- and sparked one of the quickest sellouts of any Playboy issue. Sable plans another shoot for later this year.

When her WWF contract runs out, Sable plans to pursue an acting career.

But her success will never erase the memory of what happened on that lonely road in the early morning hours of Oct. 19, 1991. Teresa concluded, "I don't think it will ever go away -- for any of us."


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