Cash Wheeler almost retired after his 2023 arrest.
In August 2023, AEW’s Cash Wheeler was arrested and charged with aggravated assault after he allegedly flashed a firearm during an alleged road rage incident. The case was officially closed in May of this year, and now the 37-year-old, along with his tag team partner, have directly discussed the proceedings from their point of view.
Speaking to Renee Paquette on AEW Close Up, FTR sat down to talk about the charges brought against Wheeler, with Cash first opening up about the effect the situation had on him, underlying his determination to prove his innocence.
“It was a very rough patch. From August, when I found out about it, to May when everything finally got dismissed, as it should have been the whole time. It was a long stretch. There was a point in time where I couldn’t think about life after May because I knew everything hinged on that. That was the be all, end all. I told my lawyers when it happened; I would not take any sort of plea deal, I would not plead guilty to any charge. I was not guilty and I would not take any sort of plea. On the flip of that, it means I faced the full repercussions if they do find me guilty,”
-Cash Wheeler
When asked what might have happened had he have been found guilty, Wheeler admits that he doesn’t know what things would have been like if he couldn’t prove his innocence, but he did everything he could to navigate the situation.
“I don’t know for sure because it’s based on priors and history, which I don’t have. The maximum, if the judge sees fit, is five years in prison. I knew that, but I also knew that I didn’t do it and I was not going to sit here and be like, ‘I’ll take any charge to not go to jail.’ If I do that, AEW has to get rid of me. I can never leave the country again. Everything I ever worked for, over something that never happened. The way it all went about, I don’t see how it ever got that far. I didn’t find out about it until a week after the fact. They never pulled me over and found anything. They never came to my house and searched. They never had a witness, a picture, a video. All they had was one guy’s statement and that was it. I found out a week later that there was already an arrest warrant for me.”
-Cash Wheeler
To offer his perspective, Harwood recalls Wheeler almost retiring from wrestling in the midst of the charges, with Dax having to talk his partner out of hanging up his boots last year.
“I don’t want to speak for him. From my perspective, he told me when everything happened. I guess a week after he told me what happened, he said, we have two separate contracts. He said, ‘I think I’m going to retire because I don’t want to subject you to any of this stuff that I’m going through.’ He knew the backlash on Twitter because it’s a cesspool. ‘I’m just going to retire. You don’t have to worry because your contract is with you. I’m going to leave wrestling.’ I had to talk him into not retiring,”
-Dax Harwood
On this, Wheeler said wrestling was his only escape from the situation, but it was hard because he didn’t know whether any match he had would be his last.
“For me, I didn’t love it. At the same time, it was the only chance I had to escape from that. I literally didn’t know which match would be the last one. Every time we were going out there, ‘Alright, let’s go out there.'”
-Cash Wheeler
Harwood also discussed how hard the pair have worked throughout their time together, and noted that it was their match with The Young Bucks at All In 2023 that made them think that things would turn out well for them, particularly due to the ongoing support of the AEW fans that they felt at Wembley Stadium.
As always, we’ll aim to provide any further updates on FTR as soon as we hear more.
