Ashley Perez, the estranged wife of pro golfer Pat Perez, broke her silence Monday on what she says happened between her and Phil Mickelson. She posted on her Instagram Story that she’s standing with “millions of women who have been silenced to protect the evil and darkness that lurks amongst us.”
Her post comes days after a report detailed an alleged encounter where Mickelson showed her a naked photo of himself on his phone. The claim was first reported by the golf site Skratch, which spoke with Perez about the incident. She said it happened while the Perezes were staying next door to Mickelson at a tournament. “Pat still had to play,” she told Skratch. “I didn’t want it to get messy.”
The allegations don’t stop there. A woman who worked at a golf club also accused the three-time Masters winner of what she called “nonconsensual and inappropriate physical contact.” That separate claim has been circulating in the golf media for weeks now.
Mickelson’s team pushes back
Mickelson’s attorney, Tom Clare, released a statement to People on June 29 calling the coverage reckless. “A small segment of the golf media has decided that because Mr. Mickelson is a successful golfer, every detail of his private and family life is theirs to exploit,” Clare said. “It is the pursuit of clicks at the expense of the truth. Do better.”
A spokeswoman for Mickelson also weighed in, saying some of the allegations are false and others revisit mistakes he’s already addressed. “Stacking the disputed claims next to the ones he has owned does not make them credible,” she said. “It instead contributes to a false and misleading narrative.”
She added that Mickelson’s priority is his family, specifically a “private family health matter.” His wife, Amy, has been with him for 35 years, the spokeswoman said, and supports him “with extraordinary grace.”
This isn’t coming out of nowhere
Mickelson was already banned from The Farms Golf Club in California. He also left two other clubs under what people in the golf world describe as abrupt departures, with personal conduct cited as a primary factor. None of those clubs have publicly detailed exactly what happened, but the pattern is hard to ignore.
Ashley Perez made it clear she’s not backing down. Her Instagram post ended with a promise: “Thank you dearly for the love and support. My heart goes out to the countless other victims.” Whether more people come forward now is anyone’s guess. But the conversation around Mickelson’s off-course behavior just got a lot louder.
Leave a Comment