by Karanja A. Ajanaku
kajanaku@tri-statedefender.com

Wendy Wilson was thrust into the limelight after Lorenzen Wright was murdered and now feels that she has become an easy target.

During a conversation last week at an East Memphis restaurant, Wilson – Wright’s former assistant – met with the Tri-State Defender to set the record straight about her friendship with the former NBA player and hometown hero whose bullet-riddled body was found about five weeks ago in a field in Southeast Memphis.

Wright’s killer(s) remain at-large. Police have not named any suspects and Wilson’s suggestion that investigators closely check out Wright’s ex-wife has stirred controversy, and led to threats against her and legal challenges.

Wilson and her attorney recently filed a lawsuit alleging that two local media personalities and the attorney for Wright’s ex-wife have slandered her. They want a “barrage of media misconceptions” to stop.

Wilson’s story

Wilson said she met Wright in 2002 or 2003 while she was working for Flinn Broadcasting. She went to Wright’s sports cafe on Mendenhall while awaiting a meeting with a client.

“I never had a little brother... (Lorenzen Wright) was the closest that I got,” said Wright’s former assistant Wendy Wilson. “I was his loyal faithful assistant to the end.” (Photo by Tyrone P. Easley)

“I didn’t know football from basketball. I didn’t know golf from lacrosse,” she said.

Wright greeted her when she arrived, later asking if he could join her. He guessed that she might be a lawyer, a profession that she said does now loom as a possibility.

Wilson had never even been to a Grizzlies game. As the conversation progressed, Wilson was taken aback when Wright offered her a job. He explained that he was a basketball player and needed a professional, business-minded person to help out his manager.

Wilson was going through a divorce at the time and the extra money was right on time, she said.

“He was like an angel from day one,” said Wilson. “All these things that you hear about him, none of them are true…He was not a drug dealer. He was not a shady character.”

Wilson said she is not a controversial person, just one that “likes what’s right. He and I have never had a disagreement.”

Her responsibility was “everything” from organizing endorsements and travel to decorating a home he had bought for a friend. Wright, she said, also had her work for his mother, Deborah.

Wilson grew silent at times, blinking back tears as she recalled Wright. She worked for him until within two weeks of the death of Wright’s 11-month-old daughter, Sierra, who died in March 2003 of sudden infant death syndrome. And even after that, when called upon, Wilson said she would help out.

Wright had become a father-figure for her son, teaching him to play basketball.

Gone too soon

Wilson’s father, an educator, was murdered, so she understands the grief that comes when someone you love is taken away so unexpectedly, she said. The memories have been rushing back to her lately, since Wright’s death.

Her mother worked for the U.S. Department of Defense. “They gave me everything that they could,” she said, noting that she grew up in comfort. Wilson graduated from Catholic High School and her higher education includes a Bachelor of Arts Degree from LeMoyne-Owen College.

“People probably say, ‘Who does she think she is?’ It’s not who that I think I am, It’s who I know I am. My mother and father did not go through all of this for me to be trashed. I’m not trash; I’m a treasure. I know who I belong to. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

The tapes

Wilson wants to make it clear she has not made a direct accusation against Wright’s ex-wife, Sherra; she said only that investigators should take a look at her given that Wilson had tape recordings of threats allegedly made by Sherra Wright.

She recalled letting Wright and Wright’s mother hear the tapes and that Wright told her to hold on to them. Wilson said she made a report to the police because she did not want it to appear, later, that she had something to hide.

“He asked me to make sure, if he ever needed it, and that is what I did. And I don’t regret it. That’s what a friend does,” said Wilson.

As for setting the record straight, Wilson wants the public to know, “There was no romantic interest. Clearly, if you saw us together, it was clearly business, brother and sister.”

Some, she said, have suggested that she did not actually work for Wright, a claim she dismisses with evidence to be produced in court, if needed.

Different media entities have been digging into her background, she said. And she chafes at one media personality’s assertion that she is insane. “I’m not insane.”

She produced a career resume and letters of recommendation, including one from former NBA and University of Memphis Tigers basketball star Anfernee Hardaway, dated July 17, 2010.

Wilson, who said her phone has blown up with threats since her telephone number was given out on a radio talk show, said she did all she could for Wright. For her, it’s now about continuing on with the raising of her son. The lawsuit she has filed is in keeping with that goal, she said.

Summing up her relationship with Wright, Wilson said, “I never had a little brother... (Wright) was the closest that I got…”

“I was his loyal faithful assistant to the end.”