One day after a report that the voice of Manti Te’o’s fake girlfriend belonged to the man who masterminded the hoax, Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, another voice has emerged — that of his female cousin. Yes, it just keeps on getting more and more wacky.
Relatives of Tino Tuiasosopo, a woman in her mid-20s who lives in Pago Pago, American Samoa, told the New York Post that Te’o has been speaking to her.
“Tino is the girl that Manti has been talking to all these months,” said a Tuiasosopo cousin, according to the Post.
In an interview with ESPN’s Jeremy Schaap on Friday, Te’o said that he had discovered that a cast of characters portrayed Lennay Kekua, the fake girlfriend who had supposedly been in a serious car accident and then died of leukemia.
When asked who he had been speaking to all that time, Te’o said: “Two guys and a girl are responsible for the whole thing.”
He was asked if he knew who they were and he said: “I don’t know. I don’t know. According to Ronaiah, Ronaiah’s one.”
According to Ronaiah Tuiasosopo’s relatives, another is Tino Tuiasosopo, who works for her father’s construction company.
A source told the newspaper that she became the voice of Te’o’s girlfriend after another long-distance relationship that had “extraordinary similarities” to the Te’o saga ended in late 2011. Te’o says his relationship with “Kekua” began in 2009, however, making it very possible others portrayed “Kekua.”
Tino Tuiasosopo’s relatives are certain that at least on voice mails Te’o supplied for his appearance on Katie Couric’s television show this week, Tino’s voice can be heard.
A person identified as Tino Tuiasosopo’s cousin said: “There is no doubt whatsoever that it’s Tino.”
After listening to the tape of “Kekua” hysterically accusing Te’o of having another girl in his room, one of the Post’s sources said: “That’s the way [Tino] cries when she’s feeling sorry for herself. Its her, that’s the voice.”
Although the quality of the recording is not very good on all of the clips, the voice does sound feminine.
“It didn’t sound like a man,” Te’o told Couric during the interview that aired Thursday. “It sounded like a woman. It’s incredible that he can make that noise.”
