STAND BY YOUR STORY

Late country singer Tammy Wynette—best known such classic heartland anthems as "Stand By Your Man" and "D.I.V.O.R.C.E."—faked her 1978 kidnapping ordeal to cover up an attack by her husband, according to "Tammy Wynette: My Mother's Story," a new book by the late singer's daughter.

In 1978, Wynette told police that she was abducted at gunpoint by a masked man outside a Nashville shopping center, driven 80 miles and beaten up by her abductor, shattering her cheekbone. According to Wynette's story, her assailant then dumped her at the side of the road and drove off. No one was ever arrested.

But according to her daughter Jackie Daly, Wynette concocted the story to keep her husband, record producer George Richey, from being jailed for assault. Daly claims that Wynette lived in fear of Richey—the singer's fifth husband—who married Wynette four months before the ordeal.

Richey has denied the claim. "Jackie's allegations that I abused Tammy are preposterous," he told the National Enquirer, our paper of record. "I spent 20 years loving her and taking care of her and her career."

"I hope Jackie enjoys the money she was paid for this hideous story," Richey added. "Tammy would be mortified if she knew what she had done. And did you know I once caught Jackie hanging up one of her mom's dresses with a wire hanger?"

Last year, Dalyand three other Wynette daughters lobbied for the singer's body to be exhumed, claiming the country superstar's surgeon had performed several unnecessary operations which led to her death. Wynette died in April 1998.