Tag Archives: arrest
By: Bryant Romero
Former 4 division world champion Adrien Broner was arrested on Monday night and booked at the Atlanta Fulton County Jail on a misdemeanor charge of sexual battery according to many reports and later confirmed by jail records. The troubled 28-year-old is scheduled to appear before a Judge at 9am Tuesday, TMZ reports. Broner is alleged to have inappropriately groped a woman at the Lenox Square shopping center as BSO is reporting the incident took place in front of the Louis Vuitton store. Broner has denied the allegation.
Broner has had many incidents with the law outside of the ring with a criminal history that includes charges of robbery (2007 and 2010), aggravated robbery (2007), felonious assault (2007, gun charges (2007 and 2008) and battery (2013). Just last April, Broner was arrested in Covington, Kentucky on an open warrant for a 2014 public intoxication charge after police had pulled him over in a SUV filled with bullet holes. Later that year, a video surfaced of Broner sucker punching a man and knocking him out cold at the Las Vegas strip in which a summons for battery was issued for the incident.
Broner (33-3, 24 KOs) is scheduled to fight Omar Figueroa in a Showtime televised main event on April 21 at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, New York. There is still no word if the recent arrest of Broner will affect the upcoming bout with Figueroa.
Prior to the incident, Broner had pleaded with his followers that major changes were coming to his boxing career. He promised to get back to the top and even made changes to his corner by working with veteran trainer Kevin Cunningham. However, disturbing posts to his social media accounts would surface not long before the incident in Atlanta.
The 28-year-old is now considered one of the big busts in boxing after being groomed by the PBC as being their next PPV star. The promotion had hoped to break him through that barrier by lining him up with significant fights that could propel his career to the next level. Broner would failed miserably with each opportunity however, losing a clear unanimous decision to Marcos Maidana in December of 2013, followed a by terrible performance to Shawn Porter once again losing by unanimous decision, and a one-sided lost last July to Mikey Garcia.
Another bad loss could spell the end of the Broner’s career as a main event headliner.
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Original Gangster: Antandil Khurtsidze Arrested In Organized Crime Roundup
By: Sean Crose
Okay, I admit that title is a bit disingenuous. The truth is that here in the United States of America, one is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Therefore, middleweight Antandil Khurtsidze, who was arrested on Wednesday in a roundup of people reputedly connected to what the United States’ Attorney of the Southern District of New York referred to as “a Russian and Georgian Criminal Enterprise,” has done nothing wrong in the eyes of society. Still, the man is now up on charges and his upcoming title bout with Billy Joe Saunders is at least temporarily kaput. That does not constitute a good day.
Specifically, Khurtsidze, a 33-2-2 product of the nation of Georgia who now lives in Brooklyn, is standing accused of conspiring to commit wire fraud and with breaking the RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization) Act. If convicted, the man can face decades in prison, be fined a ton of money and eventually end up under supervised release. The group Khurtsidze is reputedly connected to is known as the Shulaya Enterprise, a Russian/Georgian crime syndicate led by one Razhden Shulaya.
Among the Enterprise’s alleged operations are: illegal poker establishments in Brighton Beach, the extortion of gamblers and business owners, the attempted high tech defrauding of casinos, the theft of 10,000 pounds of chocolate (it’s true), the theft of other cargo shipments, the employment of a female Enterprise member to lure in and rob unsuspecting males (after rendering the victim’s unconscious with gas), the movement of untaxed cigarettes, the intention to open an after hours club (where, among other things, illegal narcotics would be sold), plans to bribe law enforcement, and forgery. With an assortment of charges, such as a “murder for hire conspiracy” and “conspiracy to sell firearms to a felon” lodged against its members, the Shulaya Enterprise appears to be quite a fearsome group – at least on paper.
All of this, of course, leaves middleweight titlist Billy Joe Saunders high and dry. He and Khurtsidze were supposed to fight in England this July. Now that his opponent has far more pressing things to attend to, Saunders will have to wait for another opportunity to fight. This, of course, only adds to the strangeness of Saunders’ title reign, which has consisted of twitter rants, long periods of time outside the ring and a ho-hum performance against Artur Akavov last December.
Still, Saunders’ future looks to be far brighter than Khurtsidze’s is at the moment. Sometimes it’s good to put everything in perspective.
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Anthony Dirrell Speaks Out On Last Saturday Night
By: Sean Crose
Boxing once again received some negative attention last Saturday night when chaos ensued after the Andre Dirrell-Jose Uzcategui super middleweight bout in Maryland. Dirrell was sent down and out by a punch that landed after the bell. Uzcategui was disqualified, but Dirrell’s uncle and trainer, Leon Lawson Jr, sucker punched Uzcategui twice in the fight’s aftermath. He’s now being sought by Maryland police. There was also an incident, however, involving Dirrell’s sibling, Anthony, for video shows the younger Dirrell brother pushing an individual in the post-fight madness. The man who was pushed is said to have been a Maryland commissioner. Needless to say, word was out that the police were quite interested in Anthony’s actions that night, as well as his uncles’.
Anthony Dirrell himself, however, claims the police weren’t interested in him at all last weekend. “They wasn’t even looking for me,” Dirrell said over the phone. “They never interviewed me or nothing.” Dirrell even claimed that the police were rather helpful after the madness that transpired at the MGM Grand National Arena. “They escorted me to my brother’s room,” he claimed. Dirrells’ assertions coincide with those of his representative, Kira Kusky, who I had spoken with earlier in the day. “He is not in any jeopardy,” she said when I asked about a police investigation. “No, not at all.”
And so Anthony Dirrell looks clear to meet Callum Smith next September in California for the WBC world super middleweight title. There was word that the championship battle would be put off due to legal matters stemming from last Saturday, but both Dirrell and his representative assured me that wouldn’t be the case. “His next fight is still on,” Kusky said, a fact Dirrell himself reiterated when we spoke a short time later. “I don’t see how (the fight could be off),” he claimed. “Nobodies’ looking for me.” It’s clear, then, that Dirrell and his team feel it is safe to focus on the talented and undefeated Smith without being impeded by legal matters.
As for older brother, Andre – who found himself on the mat after the bell last Saturday – Dirrell claims he’s doing well. “My bother’s fine,” he said. The saga of Leon Lawson Jr, uncle and trainer, has yet to be resolved (he’s still wanted by police, after all), yet it looks like both Dirrell brothers themselves are free to carry on with their respective careers. Before the call ended I asked Anthony if he’d like to, through his perspective, go over the events at the MGM Grand National Arena. “No,” he responded. “I’m not talking about that.”
