A Richmond, Virginia, man is facing an abduction charge after cops say he taped his wife to a chair in their basement.
Anonymous sources told Virginia Statewide Incidents, a Facebook news page, that part of Terry Ward’s motive was clearing the way so he could watch football upstairs, according to WTVR, a local CBS affiliate.
Ward, 64, was arrested after police were called to the couple’s Maplewood Avenue home near Byrd Park on the night of Sunday, Oct. 11, which happens to be the holiest night of the week for gridiron devotees.
According to a criminal complaint filed in Richmond court, Ward’s wife told the responding officer her husband had restrained her with tape in the basement. He allegedly admitted to cops that he did it.
Officers spotted marks and tape residue on the woman’s arms. She told them she’d been stuck down there for 30 to 45 minutes, roughly one quarter of an NFL game once you add commercials, replay reviews, and injury timeouts.
Ward is due back in court on Nov. 10.
He’s hardly the first fan to treat his marriage with disdain.
Back in 2014, a Russian Manchester United diehard named Mikhail Sindeyev had already negotiated permission to watch every one of his club’s games. When he got greedy and wanted to watch the Russian league, the Spanish league, the Champions League and the World Cup too, he first bribed his wife with spa getaways and an online seminar. Then he launched a website where nearly 40,000 men signed their wives over to a “guardian” for the length of the tournament. The women got TV shows, Portuguese lessons and a shot at a trip to Brazil, along with a promise that they would be returned in one piece. His wife never weighed in.
In Beijing in 2010, Wang Xuemin’s husband banned her from mentioning chores or touching the remote during World Cup matches. Her one job was to have the beer and snacks lined up before kickoff. She responded by founding a “soccer widows” support group, whose survival guide became a national sensation.
In a much more harmless story, in 2008, Oklahoma dad-to-be Elton Rogers headed to Dallas for the OU-Texas game while his wife was in the hospital with contractions. In his defense, she’d signed off on the trip months earlier, under strict terms: her father got the spare ticket, and if labor kicked in on game day, Rogers had to hightail it back to Lawton.
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