The lawyer for former Minnesota Vikings
punter Chris Kluwe has named the witnesses who can back up anti-gay
claims against Mike Priefer.
Kluwe wrote in a scathing op-ed
published earlier this month that he was fired from the team by
special-teams coordinator Priefer, whom he called a “bigot,” and
two “cowards”: then-head coach Leslie Frazier and general manager
Rick Spielman.
Kluwe alleged that Priefer made several
anti-gay comments in the course of objecting to his advocacy on the
issue of marriage equality and quoted Priefer as saying during a team
meeting, “We should round up all the gays, send them to an island,
and then nuke it until it glows.”
Priefer immediately and “vehemently”
denied the charges. The Vikings responded by hiring outside counsel
to investigate the claims.
Kluwe's lawyer, Clayton Halunen, on
Saturday said that Kluwe identified
kicker Blair Walsh and long snapper Cullen Loeffler as witnesses
during a 5-hour meeting with investigators on Friday.
Halunen
told the
Pioneer
Press that text messages
from Walsh can corroborate Kluwe's allegations.
The messages reference Priefer's
disparaging comments, Halunen said.