Mark Hunt files RICO lawsuit against the UFC, Brock Lesnar, and Dana White
He said he was going to do it and he did. On Tuesday, UFC heavyweight Mark Hunt filed a RICO lawsuit in Nevada federal court against the UFC, Brock Lesnar, and Dana White. Other charges include conspiracy to commit crime related to racketeering, fraud, false pretenses, breach of contract, breach of covenant of good faith and fair dealing, negligence, and unjust enrichment.
Hunt unloads in his complaint, citing the Fertitta brothers “2000 percent return on their 2001 investment,” the UFC’s “disproportionate share” of revenue, “contractual compulsion” to fight opponents who use performance enhancing drugs (PEDs), and the obstruction of “fair competition.”
Regarding Lesnar, Hunt claims, “Without HUNT’s knowledge or consent, the UFC conspired and caused LESNAR, a doping fighter, to fight HUNT, a clean fighter, despite the fact that LESNAR used substances banned by the UFC, USADA and WADA. The substances, Clomiphene and 4-Hydroxyclomiphene, are known ‘Post Cycle Therapy’ (‘PCT’) substances believed to be used after a period of strength training with anabolic steroids or similar prohibited substances.”
Hunt cites a pattern of conduct that consistently jeopardizes fighter health and safety for profit including the granting of doping and drug test exemptions to known dopers and causing them to compete with clean fighters, noting that his last three opponents had used PEDs.
As a factual allegation common to all Hunt’s causes of action, he claims the UFC suppressed Vitor Belfort’s drug test results for UFC 152, and walks through a timeline of how a UFC paralegal inadvertently e-mailed Belfort’s drug test results to 29 other fighters, trainers, and managers. His results were flagged for having free testosterone approximately 2.5 times the normal range.
“Notwithstanding Belfort’s drug test result, the UFC concealed and actively suppressed by threat of litigation the test results, and caused and permitted…