SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — There have been more non-corroborated stories about the worst night of Robert Allenby’s life than you would find at a Vegas bachelor party gone awry.
Allenby — who claimed to have been kidnapped, robbed and beaten on Jan. 17 in Hawaii — decided to try clearing the air at a packed press conference Tuesday preceding the Waste Management Phoenix Open.
The problem is there is so much Allenby says he cannot remember and there are so many conflicting accounts surrounding the night in question — the story remains as foggy as it was before Allenby spoke to reporters.
Allenby lashed out at the media, blaming it for turning him from a victim to someone who did something wrong.
“There has definitely been a lot of confusion, but I think the No. 1 thing that you should all remember is that my story stays exactly the same as the way I told it,’’ Allenby said. “I told you what I knew, and I told you what someone told me. That’s the bottom line. I never lied to anyone.
“Obviously the media have decided that they are the most amazing experts at investigations. What has been blown out of proportion a little bit is I was a victim, and all of a sudden you’re putting all the blame on me. I have no problem in the world in owning up to if I did do something wrong. But from about 11:06 [p.m.] to about 1:27 a.m. [that night], I have no memory in my brain. I have nothing.
“I can’t tell you how frustrating that is, because we all want to know the truth. We all want to get to the bottom of it. I was in a place having a nice dinner and having a nice night, and then I became a victim, and now.’’
“Physically, apart from a few scratches and that, I’m starting to feel really good,” he said.
Allenby, who earlier that day had missed the cut at the Sony Open, said he was at the wine bar with his caddie, Mick Middlemo, and another friend and he went to the bathroom while his friends waited “and I never came back.’’
Closed circuit TV police obtained shows him leaving the wine bar with several men who, Allenby said on Tuesday he did not know.
“I have never met them in my life,’’ he said. “I only saw them on surveillance cameras, and that’s it.
I don’t recall seeing them in there, and I remembered everything up to 10:48 [p.m.], maybe 11:06. From 11:06, I have no memory.’’
Allenby told police he was stuffed in a car, driven several miles from the wine bar, beaten, robbed and thrown into the street.
A homeless woman named Charade Keane told Allenby she found him and helped him to safety.
Since that Jan. 17 account, though, there have been numerous conflicting stories from other homeless people who witnessed Allenby that night. They said they found Allenby lying in the street some 100 yards away from the wine bar.
One homeless man said Allenby got the cuts on his nose and forehead from falling on a rock because he was unable to stand on his own.
Most recently, the Daily Mail reported Allenby had spent $3,400 in an area strip club.
Allenby said he has “no memory’’ of going to a strip club.
Allenby said he believes someone might have drugged his drink to cause him to become so inebriated.
Asked if he drank enough that night to have made him black out for those two-plus hours, he said,
“There’s no way in the world what I drank could do what was done to me, not a chance in the world.’’
He said he has taken a drug test, but did not reveal the results.
The lightest moment in what was an otherwise tense press conference came when a reporter asked Allenby: “How are you feeling now? You talked about your headaches, your eye. How do you feel going into this tournament?’’
“Well, I’m hitting the ball well,’’ Allenby said, drawing laughter.
“Mentally, I’m preparing myself for probably one of the toughest weeks of my life. It hasn’t been an easy week last week, and it wasn’t an easy decision to come to this tournament. But I thought that I need to get my life back on track.
“I’m a professional golfer, and why should I let controversy put me out of the game that I love?’’