Columnist Dean Juipe: FBI errs in zeroing in on King

Dean Juipe

Tuesday, June 8, 1999 | 9:34 a.m.

Dean Juipe's column appears Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. His boxing notebook appears Thursday. Reach him at 259-4084 or juipe@ lasvegassun.com

In what reeked of a publicity stunt, agents with the Federal Bureau of Investigation barged into the Florida offices of Don King Productions last Friday. On the pretense of looking for information regarding payoffs to boxing organizations for favorably ranking specific fighters, the FBI hauled out boxes of business records as the media stood guard out front.

Allegedly prompted by a New Jersey grand jury investigation into the International Boxing Federation (among other related subjects), the FBI may or may not have discovered the records it sought.

But it made for a nice wire-service photo and it served the purpose of letting the country know the government is getting tough with the sordid sport of boxing! (Yeah, right.)

King was the targeted promoter yet the truth is simply understood by everyone affiliated with the sport: Of course payoffs exist.

Hopefully the FBI didn't think it had really stumbled on to something earth shattering.

Arguably, the occasional payoff to move a man up in a given organization's rankings is a lousy way to conduct business. Naturally, the world would be a better place if that wasn't the practice.

But as to whether it's a federal crime or whether the FBI should be spending untold man hours on it is another question. Surely the Bureau has something better to do.

If the charge against King is paying off the IBF or the World Boxing Council or the World Boxing Association, he's almost certainly guilty. Each of those organizations is ruled by a single man with an iron -- and extended -- hand: Bob Lee of the IBF; Jose Sulaiman of the WBC; and Gilberto Mendoza of the WBA. It's fairly safe to say their influence can be bought and that many promoters around the world do it on a regular basis.

The fans are the losers in that they will periodically be paying to see a highly ranked fighter who is only in a title fight because his path was greased by payoffs from his promoter, but boxing fans are accustomed to that slap in the face. As revolting as it may seem, fans would put payoffs way down the list of boxing's ills.

But as long as the FBI is going to so much trouble, maybe it should look into King's dealings with the WBA regarding a 168-pound fighter from Florida by the name of Byron Mitchell. He's topical because he's fighting WBA super middleweight champ Frankie Liles of Las Vegas this Saturday in Massachusets.

Mitchell is 19-0 but has never fought anyone of even marginal consequence. In early 1998 he was 15-0 and ranked No. 11 by the WBA; he moved up to No. 9 in the summer; slipped to No. 11 in the fall; jumped to No. 4 in the winter; and magically moved into the coveted No. 1 spot -- and therefore an automatic fight with Liles -- earlier this year. (Think King's records are complete enough to include that check to Mendoza?)

Mitchell did absolutely nothing in the ring to merit rising through the ranks and when he moved into the No. 1 position he supplanted a man who hadn't lost, the presumably under-capitalized Bruno Girard. As you may have already deduced, Mitchell's chief asset is that he is signed with Don King Productions.

Buying rankings -- and an even newer spinoff, "interim" championships -- may be detestable but it hardly qualifies as a crime. Let's call it a nuisance and move on.