http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/sun/1997/jun/09/505977998.html
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Boxer’s fine set, but not the payment schedule
LAS VEGAS (AP) – State boxing regulators will try once again
next week to fine Oliver McCall $250,000 for crying and refusing to
fight during his heavyweight title bout with Lennox Lewis.
Whether McCall will be able to pay the fine, though, is not so
certain.
McCall has agreed to the fine and to a one-year suspension from
boxing for his bizarre actions during the Feb. 8 fight in Las
Vegas.
But his $3 million purse from the fight is still tied up in a
New Jersey court dispute, and he may have to wait to pay.
“He’s going to have to be paid if he’s going to be fined,”
said McCall’s attorney, Marty Keach. “They can’t fine him without
paying him.”
The Nevada Athletic Commission will meet Wednesday to consider a
proposed settlement with McCall over charges that he brought
disrepute to the sport of boxing by quitting in the ring against
Lewis.
The agreement had been expected in April, but was delayed
because of the New Jersey court action.
Fight promoter Main Events Inc. is asking a federal court to
rule that McCall should have to forfeit at least some of his purse,
and HBO is asking for the purse back because it says McCall didn’t
give a credible performance.
Main Events and HBO hold a letter of credit for the $3 million
purse, and contend that McCall should not get it because he stopped
fighting in the fourth round of the scheduled 12-round fight for
the WBC title.
A federal judge in Newark, N.J., has said he will determine who
gets what from the purse, but no date for a hearing on the case has
been set.
McCall claimed a day after the fight that he was simply using a
ring strategy when he stopped throwing punches and defending
himself in the fourth round.
Even McCall’s own trainer, though, said there was no such plan
and called the boxer “a lunatic.”
After the fourth round McCall stood and cried in his corner, and
referee Mills Lane finally stopped the fight at 55 seconds of the
fifth round.