It's been a rough and extremely bizarre year for Australian professional golfer and four-time PGA Tour winner Robert Allenby. In January, hours after finishing his second round at the Sony Open in Hawaii, Allenby claimed to have been beaten, robbed, and kidnapped as he was settling up his tab at a Waikiki wine bar, and then dumped out of a car 6 1/2 miles away.
The following week, however, several witnesses on scene at the wine bar came out and refuted Allenby's story. Charade Keane, a homeless woman that Allenby said had first told him he'd been dumped out of the car by "a few guys", denied this report entirely. Instead, she told KITV in Honolulu that when she found Allenby, he was sitting across the street from the wine bar with two other homeless men and was already bloodied.
Last weekend, Allenby again made headlines, this time because he fired his caddie, the veteran Mick Middlemo, during the middle of his opening round at the RBC Canadian Open after a disagreement over club selection. Allenby landed a 150-yard approach shot in the water because, as ScoreGolf.com first reported, he felt Middlemo had suggested the wrong club. After a verbal disagreement between the two, Allenby promptly fired him and let a fan carry his bag for the remainder of the round. Allenby ended up shooting an 81, and withdrew from the tournament.
Middlemo, it appears, isn't pleased with the whole situation. Shortly after being fired, he told News Corp Australia that he believed Allenby had lied about the kidnapping and injured his face probably because he "just fell over s---faced drunk."
Then, in response to Middlemo's allegations, Anthony Puntoriero—Allenby's close friend and the man that was with him at the wine bar on the night of the abduction—came out to bash the caddie and stand by Allenby's account from the night.
"I am livid because Mick was with us the next day looking at CCTV footage of how Robert left the place, he has seen it all, and yet he makes the claim he did," Puntoriero told ABC Australia.
The whole story has basically turned into a he-said-she-said ordeal and feels a lot like a fight you were involved in at some point during middle school, minus the kidnapping.
What is clear about this entire debacle, however, is that Allenby was robbed at some point that night. A month after the original incident, Owen Harbison was arrested for identity theft, unauthorized possession of confidential personal information, and attempted theft after buying $23,000 of jewelry, clothing, and gift cards in Honolulu on Allenby's stolen card.
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