By James Caldwell, Torch assistant editor

The father of deceased former WWE wrestler Lance Cade (Lance McNaught) is speaking out against WWE and Linda McMahon, who he said "disrespected" Cade and his family last week. The story goes beyond a personal rebuttal, but accusations that WWE encouraged Cade to use steroids, and was rewarded for doing so, during his career.

Last week, Linda McMahon made the now-infamous comment that she "might have met him once" when asked by a group of reporters to comment on Cade's death on August 13. She also passed the buck to Cade for his reported prescription drug abuse issues that likely contributed to his death, saying, "who knows what causes people to have addictions."

"I've been with him on two different WWE functions where she came up to him and knew him by name," Harley McNaught told Ted Mann of The Day publication in Connecticut. "She disrespected him. She disrespected my family."

Linda McMahon's U.S. Senate campaign spokesman, Ed Patru, issued a typically contentious statement in response. "WWE has nearly 600 employees and about 140 performers, and I think it's understandable that Linda may not recollect every interaction she's had, particularly given the fact that she's personally met with thousands of voters since resigning her position at WWE in September," Patru said. "Linda's a very kind and sympathetic person, but she is human."

The story also dives into allegations that WWE executives encouraged Cade to use steroids to "improve his look" in the early 2000s. Also, there is a dispute over what exactly led to Cade's most-recent release from WWE in April of this year.

Cade's father and Cade, through an interview conducted before his death, both contend WWE was "embarrassed" to have Cade on their roster after he completed WWE-sponsored rehab at the beginning of the year. WWE responded to The Day's report by saying a storyline for Cade's return was scrapped, essentially leaving creative with no plans for Cade on WWE TV. Cade was released by WWE in April.

The Day included quotes from Cade prior to his death where he told Kenny Bolin on the "Who's Slamming Who" podcast that, "Vince's stance (is) they do all this because they care about the talent. Bull----. They care about the image of the WWE and you care about the fact that Congress was having ... hearings about this. That's what this comes down to."

WWE responded: "Other WWE performers have successfully completed rehab and are currently on the roster. We are proud that we can offer this assistance, and of our performers who have completed these programs."

WWE spokesman Robert Zimmerman added that Cade "asked to be admitted in January 2010 and successfully completed rehab ... but was released from his contract in April after a planned story line in which he would have appeared was scrapped." Zimmerman said the company "continued to reach out to McNaught after his release."

Related to the issue of steroid use, The Day cited Cade's quotes in the interview on Who's Slamming Who that he was "encouraged" by WWE executives to use steroids in 2003, which was during a time when WWE did not have a drug-testing or Wellness policy. Cade said he was struggling to get noticed in the developmental OVW promotion, started taking steroids, and was suddenly being complimented on his in-ring ability. He was then called up to WWE's main roster later that year.

The report also tackles the issue of painkiller addiction, with more quotes from Cade's father. Mr. McNaught said Cade suffered shoulder and knee injuries in 2004 and he tried to work through the pain using prescription pills to keep his spot on the main WWE roster.

The Day reports: "The younger McNaught worked through pain as much as he could, his father said, because he and other wrestlers were wary of taking time off to heal, believing that they would be quickly passed over in favor of other talent, and would have to begin the long, slow climb of their careers all over again."

"It hurt me to see him wrestling in pain," Mr. McNaught said, "but you talk to any one of them, once you try to climb the ladder and get a spot, you shut it down (due to an injury) and you lose your spot and go right back down to the bottom. So it's, 'Here, take a few painkillers, make the world go away.'"

The addiction developed, Mr. McNaught said, because the use of painkillers "just came too easy to Lance because it took the pain away." He added that the use of the painkillers made Cade "like he was in la-la land; he would just kind of pass out."

A key passage from Ted Mann's reporting reads: "The company has been dogged by criticism that it should be doing more to prevent the wrestlers - who are independent contractors, not employees, of the company and do not receive health insurance benefits - from self-medicating, as McNaught's family says he did, to cope with pain."

FYI: That far-reaching story has been picked up by MSNBC and The Atlantic national news outlets this morning.

The Atlantic reporter has a particularly insightful remark that captures why this story and the issue is an important aspect of measuring WWE and Linda McMahon's business practices, which is essentially the only item on her resume that qualifies her to run for Senate.

"The article provides a good sense of what it's like to be an aspiring WWE wrestler, and includes a number of details that I was not aware of, and that strike me as particularly damning, given the context--that a former employee of Linda McMahon's appears to have essentially killed himself by abusing drugs. The one that really jumped out at me is that WWE wrestlers weren't even provided health insurance, so most wrestlers self-medicated."

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