The final days of Aaron Hernandez’s life and his decision to confess about his homosexual relationships are detailed in the new book Unnecessary Roughness.
The former football star’s attorney, Jose Baez, writes that he informed Hernandez in the final days of his double murder trial that prosecutors were planning to question his fiancee Shayanna Jenkins about his affairs – one with a woman and one with another man.
That is when Hernandez burst into tears writes Baez, afraid of how Jenkins would react to the news of his secret relationship with a member of the same sex who also happened to be a mutual friend of the couple.
‘But Jose, she’ll be devastated. I never meant to hurt her. I know I keep disappointing her. But she is my soul,’ Hernandez told Baez.
‘She is all I have and will ever have.’
Baez then told Jenkins, and writes that while she was blindsided and felt ‘betrayed,’ she remained by Hernandez’s side.
Hernandez’s sexuality did not remain private for long however, and days after he was acquitted in the trial he was outed on The Kirk & Callahan Show.
Two days later, Hernandez took his own life.
Breakdown: Aaron Hernandez burst into tears and said he was afraid about how his fiancee would react to the news of his homosexual relationships writes Jose Baez (Hernandez and Baez in court in October 2015)
Sweetheart: I never meant to hurt her. I know I keep disappointing her. But she is my soul,’ Hernandez told Baez (Hernandez and Jenkins above in an undated photo)
Coming clean: Baez told Jenkins the news later that day, saying that Hernandez’s affair with a woman and a mutual male friend would be brought up while she testified (couple above in undated photos)
Baez writes that he is uncertain if Hernandez was gay or bisexual, but states that either way he ultimately appeared ‘hopeful’ after sharing his truth with his lawyer.
The rest of the day was a ‘blur’ writes Baez, who called Jenkins to say that he needed to speak with her before she arrived in the courtroom.
‘This is the s*** they don’t teach in law school,’ writes Baez, who slipped out of court when he got word Jenkins was in the building and sat down to tell her the news.
‘While the news about the woman did not shake her, I could see the betrayal in her face when I mentioned the man,’ writes Baez.
‘She knew him and had spent time with him and Aaron. She felt like a fool.’
Baez does not name the man, writing that it is not his place to out a person and explaining that he only agreed to share Hernandez’s confession with the blessing of Jenkins.
In the end, prosecutors never mentioned Hernandez’s sexuality while Jenkins was on the stand or during the case, and after some ‘soul searching,’ Jenkins was back in court the day after learning about the relationship between her fiance and their friend.
‘That is why she will always walk on water as far as I am concerned,’ writes Baez.
She’s not perfect. No one is. Her compassion is an inspiration. Her love for him is something I will never forget.’
Hernandez was acquitted a few days later, and a few days after that was outed on Kirk & Callahan.
The football player was called a ‘tight end on and off the field’ and a ‘wide receiver.’
The guest that day, Michelle McPhee, later said that she regretted the way the hosts handled the news, but pointed out that in her mind Hernandez should have been ‘more haunted by killing his friend.’
In the new book, Jenkins also admits for the first time that Hernandez was likely a gay man.
‘There has been much speculation about Aaron’s sexuality since his death. I can say this: Aaron was very much a man to me,’ writes Jenkins.
‘I saw no indication that he was gay or homosexual. I wish I had known how he felt, just so we could have talked about it. I wouldn’t have disowned him. I would have been supportive. I can’t fault him if he was feeling that way.’
Baez and Jenkins both claimed in the wake of Hernandez’s suicide that he asked them to tell his story in the suicide letters he wrote to them.
‘When you love someone so much you just want to be there to support them. The fact that he felt he couldn’t come out to me or he couldn’t tell me these things hurts, because we had that bond,’ states Jenkins.
‘I’ve accepted that he may have been the way he was said to be, or that it may not be true. Regardless, I won’t know.’
Jenkins made headlines earlier this year when she announced that she was pregnant with her second child and gave birth to a daughter in June with her new beau, Dino Guilmette.
She has a daughter Avielle, 5, with Hernandez.
In her foreword, Jenkins also reveals that she was not allowed to see Hernandez at the hospital, and that he died alone as a result.
The new book Unnecessary Roughness will be released on Tuesday
‘I raced to the hospital, but the doctors wouldn’t let me be with him. His death was still under investigation, they said. Someone told me he wasn’t even at the hospital, but that was a lie because I saw him being wheeled into a room,’ writes Jenkins.
‘He had died alone. I didn’t want him to be alone any longer. I wanted to see him while all of him was still intact. I wanted to hold him.’
She continues: ‘Instead of being with my fiancé, I was told I had to wait. I didn’t see him until days later when he was already embalmed and prepared for his funeral. It was beyond awful.’
The book also reveals that Hernandez defecated on himself while in the process of taking his own life.
DailyMail.com exclusively revealed just days after Hernandez’s death that the NFL star had written three suicide notes, one to Shayanna, one to their daughter and one to his alleged gay prison lover, Kyle Kennedy.
‘I think I’m gonna hang it up. LOL,’ the former Patriots star told Kyle Kennedy.
Hernandez had also asked prison officials if Kennedy could be his roommate prior to his death.
He was still with Jenkins at the time, who he began dating in 2007 and proposed to after she became pregnant.
Jenkins is currently suing the estates of three men the former New England Patriots player was charged with killing in an effort to ensure their daughter benefits from the sale of their home.
The families of Odin Lloyd, Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado filed wrongful-death lawsuits against Hernandez’s estate, and should they win those cases, money from the mansion’s sale could be used to pay damages.
Jenkins filed on behalf of her daughter, 5, and requested a trial to determine whether Hernandez’s declaration of homestead remains in effect.
The Massachusetts Homestead Act protects up to $500,000 of a property’s equity from creditors.
Hernandez was acquitted of killing Abreu and Furtado days before his prison suicide. and his death erased his 2015 conviction in Lloyd’s killing due to an obscure legal doctrine in the state of Massachusetts.
Jenkins and her daughter are also suing the New England Patriots.
A lawsuit filed last year on behalf of the two by Baez said Hernandez had ‘the most severe case of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy medically seen in a person of his young age of 28 years’ by Boston University researchers.
The lawsuit also named the NFL initially, but they were then dropped as defendants in the case.
Hernandez had just signed a seven-year, $40 million contract with the Patriots prior to the 2012 season, one of the biggest contracts in the league at the time.
Prior to his time in New England he had numerous run-ins with the law during his college football career at the University of Florida.
Jenkins stood by Hernandez’s side throughout his trial, and in the aftermath dismissed claims that he was gay, despite his prison lover speaking out and exes confirming they knew about his predilection for members of his sex.
Family: Two days later, Hernandez hanged himself in his prison cell at the age of 27, leaving behind Jenkins and his daughter Avielle, who was just 4
Tot mom: Baez previously defended Casey Anthony back in 2011 following the death of her daughter (pair above after Anthony’s release from prison)
When asked about his prison lover on an episode of Dr. Phil, Jenkins said: ‘I don’t know who this Kyle Kennedy is. Aaron never mentioned him.’
Jenkins also claimed that Kennedy lied about getting a love letter from Hernandez after his death, with the football player leaving three notes.
The state police report said Hernandez wrote “John 3:16,” a reference to a Bible verse, in ink on his forehead and in blood on a cell wall.
The verse says: ‘For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.’
A Bible was nearby, open to John 3:16, with the verse marked by a drop of blood.
Some inmates have said Hernandez had become increasingly spiritual during his time in prison, but Jenkins said the bible verse didn’t sound like Hernandez and he’d never mentioned it to her.
Hernandez wrote in her letter to Jenkins ‘you’re rich,’ which led many to believe there was money hidden away for his widow.
Jenkins also said shortly after Hernandez’s death that she did not believe he had committed suicide.
She told Dr Phil that she thought the suicide letter was ‘a note of love’ based on the way Hernandez addressed her in his final letter.
‘I did see that it was addressed to Shay instead of you know babe or bae, the way he would refer me as – that was a little odd to me. But as far as the content, he seemed to be his loving self,’ she said.
When Dr Phil asked her if the handwriting on the note belonged to Hernandez, Shayanna said: ‘(It) was similar, but I feel like, again, you have nothing but time in there so I feel like it’s easily duplicated or could be.’