Jon Offredo

Wilmington (Del.) News Journal

DOVER, Del. — NASCAR driver Kurt Busch was described by his ex-girlfriend, Patricia Driscoll, as someone struggling with alcoholism and depression in the lead up to the night he allegedly erupted into a rage and smashed her face into the bedroom wall of his motorhome.

Attorneys for Busch described Driscoll as a mercenary who was an unbelievable storyteller, and a public relations professional who was bent on trying to destroy the driver's career.

The comments came during a day-long protection order hearing over a protection from abuse order filed by Driscoll last month.

Busch attorney Rusty Hardin suggested that whatever happened the night of Sept. 26 could have been prevented had Driscoll left the motorhome at Dover International Speedway when Busch told her to.

"I am not to blame for him putting his hands on me," said Driscoll, at times defiant and other times sobbing, prompting Family Court commissioner David Jones to order a recess at one point so she could regain her composure during the six-hour testimony.

"He sprung up from the bed, grabbed me by the throat with one hand and face with the other and smashed my face into the wall three times," Driscoll said, crying, in the courtroom. "It scared me, because he just snapped."

Busch, sitting to the far left of the stand, looked directly in front of him during the majority of Driscoll's testimony. Neither he nor his attorneys commented after the hearing, which is scheduled to resume Wednesday morning. Driscoll's attorney also declined to comment.

It is uncertain if the judge will rule Wednesday.

Driscoll testified that she became concerned about Busch after the couple fought following a race in New Hampshire, one week before the Dover incident. The couple, who had been dating for four years, had a fight, and Busch called the relationship off. That weekend, she said, Busch became violent, damaging a rental car and wrapping a seat belt around her neck.

Hardin said Driscoll was unable to accept the fact the two had split.

Driscoll said she tried to contact Busch's mother shortly after the New Hampshire incident, concerned that Busch, 36, was drinking and struggling with depression. Busch, she said during testimony, sometimes would "drink himself to death" but later re-emerge from his stupor to seek forgiveness.

"You're now calling him an alcoholic?" a combative Hardin asked Driscoll during his cross-examination. "… Why don't you just call a press conference and say every bad thing you can about him?"

Defense attorneys have denied the assault allegations, which are the subject of a separate criminal investigation by Dover police still ongoing. Hardin said Driscoll has not presented any evidence to suggest that Busch has ever physically threatened her. Driscoll said Busch's representatives have repeatedly tried to contact people close to her, and that she fears for her safety.

"I don't know what he's capable of doing," she said.

Driscoll, who said the couple fought often but would always make up, said that on the night the alleged assault, she and Busch exchanged text messages. Busch told her he was laying on the floor of his motorhome crying and that the world was "crashing down" on him, she said.

"I was really worried," she said. "… Kurt's not the kind of person to be laying on the floor crying…. He was obviously hurting."

Driscoll said she and her son drove to Dover, thinking they might be able to comfort Busch.

Driscoll said that after she let herself into the motorhome using the key code, she and Busch began arguing in whispered tones in his bedroom while her son watched TV several feet away.

During the hearing, Driscoll said Busch was critical of his Stewart-Haas Racing teammates and crew and called some of them idiots. She said Busch didn't want an extension to his two-year contract to work for the team anymore.

"His [Busch] conversations were all over the place," she added.

Busch, she said, began railing about his crewmembers at Stewart-Haas Racing and fellow drivers there. She said he was angry at teammate and SHR co-owner Tony Stewart for an August crash at an upstate New York track in which Stewart's sprint car struck and killed Kevin Ward Jr. during a dirt race after Ward exited his car under caution. She also said Busch was upset that Kevin Harvick, who went on to win this year's Sprint Cup championship, was "getting everything" while Busch was "getting nothing."

It was at that point, she said, that Busch said if he had a gun he would shoot himself.

She ran to a neighboring motorhome with her son after the incident, where she was given a bag of frozen brussel sprouts to put on her bruises.

"When he put his hands on me, he crushed my throat," she said.

Domestic abuse by professional athletes have seemed to dominate headlines recently.

--This summer, Minnesota Vikings running back Adrian Peterson was accused of reckless assault related to injuries to his 4-year-old son with a wooden switch. He pleaded no contest in November.

--In March, Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice was indicted on aggravated assault charges for assaulting his wife, then fiancee. Rice was accepted into a pretrial intervention program in May.

Driscoll heads the national charity, the Armed Forces Foundation.

According to the organization's website, Busch served as a spokesman and ambassador for the foundation, adding he is "intimately involved with the AFF's efforts and dedicates each race during the season to a service member that has been killed in action or suffers from an invisible wound of war, including PTSD."

After Driscoll filed, the AFF severed ties with Busch.

Last month, NASCAR chairman Brian France said no disciplinary action would be taken against Busch while police investigate the matter.

Contributing: Associated Press