On this day 19 July 1991(Exactly 28 years ago) Mike Tyson raped a Miss Black America contestant Desiree Washington.
Indiana Black Expo was set to host the Miss Black America pageant during its Summer Celebration, and among the celebrities in town to partake in the festivities was one of the most famous athletes in the world: Mike Tyson.
Even if Tyson’s stardom was undisputed, his career and personal life were on the ropes. In a 1988 interview on 20/20, his wife, actress Robin Givens, had alleged that she was the victim of spousal abuse. She filed for divorce a week later. In 1990, Tyson lost his heavyweight boxing title to James “Buster” Douglas, an upset for the ages.
But the knockout blow came in Indianapolis. Early in the morning on July 19, 1992, Tyson invited Desiree Washington, Miss Black Rhode Island, up to his room at the Canterbury Hotel. A day later, she checked into the emergency room at Methodist Hospital and reported that she had been raped.
Tyson stood trial before Judge Patricia Gifford in Indianapolis starting on January 27, 1992, defended by Vincent Fuller and Kathleen Beggs, big-shot attorneys from the Washington, D.C., firm Williams & Connolly, and local lawyer James Voyles. Indianapolis attorney Gregory Garrison signed on as special prosecutor, joined by Barbara Trathen from the Marion County Prosecutor’s office.
On February 10, 1992 the jury returned a guilty verdict on one count of rape and two counts of criminal deviate conduct. An appeal led by “lawyer of last resort” Alan Dershowitz was unsuccessful—“White folks refuse to admit when they make a mistake,” said Black Expo president Rev. Charles Williams—and Tyson served three years with the Indiana Department of Correction.
On this day 19 July 1986 (Exactly 33 years ago) Tim Witherspoon KO Frank Bruno in round 11 for heavyweight boxing title in London.
Witherspoon, looking fat and out of shape, knocked down Frank Bruno with four crashing rights to the head and stopped the British challenger in the 11th round early this morning to retain the World Boxing Association heavyweight championship.
Past the two-minute mark of the 11th round, Bruno landed a three-punch series to the head. Then Witherspoon crashed home an overhand right that sent Bruno reeling into a neutral corner.
Bruno escaped, but Witherspoon, seeing the end was near, slammed three more overhand rights that dropped Bruno to a sitting position in Witherspoon’s corner.
The towel was immediately thrown in from Bruno’s corner and Referee Isido Rodriguez of Venezuela saw it and stopped the fight without a count.
Until the sudden ending before some 40,000 fans at the outdoor Wembley Stadium, the fight had been on the dull side, although both men did land some hard head punches.
The time of the finish was 3 minutes of the 11th round.
Bruno, who weighed 228 pounds, never showed the vaunted right-hand power that had given him 27 knockouts.
Witherspoon, on the other hand, looked weary for much of the fight. The then 28-year-old champion from Philadelphia came in weighing 234. But he had enough to keep his title.
Before the end came, neither man went down. But Witherspoon was badly marked under the left eye and the eye appeared almost closed. Bruno suffered a cut over the left eye but was never bothered by it.
Despite his paunchiness, Witherspoon matched Bruno’s strength and actually outjabbed Bruno in many of the rounds even though the Briton had a five-inch reach advantage.
Location: Wembley Stadium, Wembley, London, United Kingdom
Referee: Isidro Rodriguez
Judge: Carlos Sucre 97-94
Judge: Marcos A. Torres 98-96
Judge: Takeshi Shimakawa 99-96
World Boxing Association Heavyweight Title (1st defense by Witherspoon)
On this day 19 July 2018 (Exactly a year ago) Brazilian soccer international goalkeeper Alisson was transferd from Roma to Liverpool for a then world record shot blocker’s fee of £66.8m
“In terms of my life and my career, it’s a huge step for me being part of this club and this family,” said the 25-year-old
‘One of the world’s best goalkeepers’
Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp said he has signed “a real personality”.
“At one point in the last few weeks it came up, the opportunity to sign one of the world’s best goalkeepers,” he added. “The owners were quite excited, so we did it.
“He has nothing to do with the price, we have nothing to do with the price. It’s the market, that’s how it is and we will not think a lot about it.
“He needs to adapt to the English Premier League. The league is different, the refs are different, the goalkeeper’s life is different in the Premier League.
“We got him here because of his existing strengths, which is in all goalkeeper departments the highest level.”
On this day 19 July 1952 (Exactly 67 years ago) XV Summer Olympic Games was opened in Helsinki, Finland with 69 nations , 4,955 athletes (4,436 men, 519 women), 149 events in 17 sports (23 disciplines.
A total of 69 nations participated in these Games, up from 59 in the 1948 Games. Thirteen nations made their first Olympic appearance in 1952: The Bahamas, the People’s Republic of China, Gold Coast (now Ghana), Guatemala, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Israel, Netherlands Antilles, Nigeria, Soviet Union (USSR), Thailand, and Vietnam.
Japan and Germany were both reinstated and permitted to send athletes after being banned for 1948 for their instigation of World War II. Due to the division of Germany, German athletes from Saar entered a separate team for the only time. Only West Germany would provide athletes for the actual Germany team, since East Germany refused to participate in a joint German team
Host City: Helsinki, Finland
Opening Ceremony: July 19, 1952
Closing Ceremony: August 3, 1952
Events for Ghana: 5 in 1 sport
Participants for Ghana: 7 (7 men and 0 women)
Youngest Participant for Ghana: Augustus Lawson (22 years, 64 days)
Oldest Participant for Ghana: Gabriel Lareya (28 years, 180 days)
Most Medals for Ghana (Athlete): No medalists
On this day 19 July 1980 (Exactly 39 years ago )22nd modern Olympic games was opened in Moscow; with 80 participation nations ,5,179 athletes (4,064 men, 1,115 women), 203 events in 21 sports (27 disciplines.
The 1980 Games were the first Olympic Games to be staged in Eastern Europe, and remain the only Summer Olympics held there, as well as the first Olympic Games to be held in a Slavic language-speaking country. They were also the first Olympic Games to be held in a socialist country, and the only Summer Games to be held in such a country until 2008 in Beijing, China. These were the final Olympic Games under the IOC Presidency of Michael Morris, 3rd Baron Killanin.
Eighty nations were represented at the Moscow Games – the smallest number since 1956. Led by the United States, 66 countries boycotted the games entirely because of the Soviet–Afghan War. Some athletes from some of the boycotting countries (they are not included in the list of 66 countries that boycotted the games entirely) participated in the games under the Olympic Flag. The Soviet Union would later boycott the 1984 Summer Olympics.
On this day 19 July 1996 (Exactly 23 years ago) 26th Olympic Games open in Atlanta, Georgia with 197 nations ,10,320 athletes (6,797 men, 3,523 women), 271 events in 26 sports (37 disciplines).
These Games, which were the fourth Summer Olympics to be hosted by the United States, marked the centenary of the 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens—the inaugural edition of the modern Olympic Games.
They were also the first since 1924 to be held in a different year from a Winter Olympics, under a new IOC practice implemented in 1994 to hold the Summer and Winter Games in alternating, even-numbered years.
BY: GEORGE ‘Alan Green’ MAHAMAH