Coach Pitino: I Paid For Blackmailer's Abortion

University of Louisville men's basketball coach Rick Pitino told police he had consensual sex in a restaurant with the woman accused of trying to extort $10 million from him -- and said he paid her $3,000 for an abortion afterward.

The Courier-Journal of Louisville obtained police records of Pitino's interview under the Kentucky Open Records Act. In the records, the married 56-year-old coach describes a drunken sexual encounter with Karen Sypher in August 2003 that is at the heart of an extortion case.

Sypher has plead not guilty to charges that she demanded Pitino pay her college tuition for her four children, $3,000 a month, money for cars and eventually $10 million. She is also accused of lying to the Feds about the sexual encounter. Two months after her indictment Sypher told police Pitino had raped her.

Pitino maintains he did not rape Sypher and police records seem to back up his case, according to the report. For one, a witness at the restaurant told the FBI he heard "the sounds of two people that seemed to be enjoying themselves during a sexual encounter.” 

Get More: Courier-Journal, MSNBC

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