The woman whose picture was used to create Manti Te'o's fake girlfriend has been identified, but the voice of the woman who had hours of late-night phone calls with the Notre Dame star linebacker has remained silent. Turns out that's because it reportedly was a man.

The lawyer for the man who has been identified as behind the hoax, Ronaiah Tuiasosopo, told the New York Daily News that his client disguised his voice and assumed the identity of Lennay Kekua to try to develop a relationship with Te'o.

Milton Grimes said that Te'o "thought it was a female he was talking with. It was Ronaiah as Lennay."

Te'o appeared on Katie Couric's television show, "Katie," this week to explain his role in the hoax. He also supplied voice mails to the program that he says are from the person whom he thought was Kekua. Although the quality of the recording is not great on all of the clips, the voice does sound feminine.

"It didn't sound like a man," Te'o told Couric during the interview that aired Thursday. "It sounded like a woman. It's incredible that he can make that noise."

Tuiasosopo, 22, has had dramatic training, plays in a Christian band and even auditioned last year for the television show "The Voice."

"Come on, Hollywood does it all the time," Grimes said of his client pretending to be a woman. "People can do that."

Couric asked Te'o what he would say to Tuiasosopo.

"I would just say you hurt me," Te'o said.

Grimes said that Tuiasosopo wasn't trying to hurt Te'o.

"This wasn't a prank to make fun," Grimes said, according to the Daily News. "It was establishing a communication with someone. ... It was a person with a troubled existence trying to reach out and communicate and have a relationship."

According to Te'o, Tuiasosopo called him to confess and apologize shortly before the story broke Jan. 16.

"He didn't say why; he just explained he wanted to help people," Te'o said. "It was his way of helping people."

Grimes wouldn't characterize the type of relationship Tuiasosopo wanted with the Heisman Trophy runner-up.

"I wouldn't describe his issues at this time," he said, according to the newspaper.

One theory for the hoax is that Te'o was trying to cover up a homosexual relationship. Couric asked Te'o if he was gay.

"No, far from it," he said. "Faaaaarrrr from it."