A former ESPN star has accused Stephen A. Smith of "lying" about his childhood tragedy.
Smith, 58, recently opened up to Graham Bensinger about a childhood tragedy. The face of ESPN revealed that he witnessed "multiple murders" during his life in New York City.
"Of course, [I've seen people shot at]. Couple of my friends got killed," Smith told Bensinger. "I've seen a couple people get gunned down. I've seen some people get killed. I've seen somebody get shot. I remember one time, one of the guys that I grew up with, um, I wouldn't say that he was a close friend, but we knew one another. He was joking around, arguing with this guy, and they were making jokes toward one another about each other's mother, who could tell the best jokes or whatever. And this one guy got the better of the other guy. The other guy goes up to him and shoots him in both kneecaps and said, ‘I told you to stop f'ing with me.’ Dropped the gun and walked away."
"That's kind of stuff that I grew up seeing," he continued. "You know, I grew up seeing one of my boys gunned down in the nightclub. Guy walked up to him, blew his head off, you know, just because he didn't like him."
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But is Smith telling the truth?
A former ESPN star and others have accused him of lying about the story, as it wasn't in his memoir a couple of years ago.
"Netflix & Stephen A's handlers have clearly told him to spice up his movie script with some additional lies. This dude is a pathological liar. None of these murders and shootings he witnessed made his memoir. But now they can be told as he runs for president. The Bride of Disney," Jason Whitlock wrote.
Shemeka Michelle, a podcaster, also expressed some doubt.
"Why would the guy drop the gun, with his fingerprints on it, and just walk away?? Did he see this in a movie?"
Smith, meanwhile, says that he always kept quiet.
"Well, unfortunately, you know, you don't like to say these things, but you know what? You keep your mouth shut. You know, people talk about snitching, no snitching or whatever, but you see something like that, you open your mouth, you might be next. And so that's the kind of environment we grew up in."
Is he telling the truth?
