With depositions barely underway in the negligence and medical malpractice suit pitting disabled ex-boxer Magomed Abdusalamov and his family against the doctors and officials from his ill-fated final fight, the bout's inspector acknowledged the New York State Athletic Commission fired him for violating a commission directive.
The inspector, Matt Farrago, is one of the officials being sued over the Nov. 2, 2013, heavyweight bout and aftermath that left Abdusalamov severely brain damaged. According to lawyers who represent the plaintiff and another defendant, and were contacted by Outside the Lines, Farrago said in a deposition Thursday that he took the wraps Abdusalamov wore underneath his gloves and walked away with Gennady Golovkin's hand wraps after the next fight on the card. He did this despite being warned against the practice after he said he'd taken other fighters' wraps to sell and raise money for the Ring10 charity he runs to benefit indigent boxers.
"His [Farrago's] integrity, as the only commission official with my client at the end, was compromised by the fact that he became to some degree a fan with an ulterior motive having nothing to do with safety," said Paul Edelstein, attorney for the Abdusalamovs. "His job is to watch for my guy's safety every second -- almost like a bodyguard -- from start to finish, and surveillance video showed that he left the locker room while Abdusalamov was still in it."
Contacted by Outside the Lines, Farrago said he is represented by the state attorney general and was instructed against speaking with anyone while the Abdusalamov case is in litigation. A commission spokesman said the NYSAC has no comment.
A former middleweight fighter, Farrago was paid $52 to serve as the commission's inspector assigned to Abdusalamov for his Theater at Madison Square Garden bout against Mike Perez. Days later, with Abdusalamov in a coma following emergency brain surgery and the night's events under investigation by the state, the commission suspended Farrago.
Farrago admitted in the deposition that against commission policy, he photographed Abdusalamov before and after the fight to have authentication of the wraps. He said he was eventually fired by David Berlin, who was appointed executive director of the commission in March 2014.
Abdusalamov, who went the 10-round distance in a unanimous and bloody defeat, suffered a facial fracture, a broken hand and a deep laceration above his eye that required stitches. Abdusalamov's handlers said commission doctors elected against sending him to the hospital in an on-site ambulance and told them he would need to be examined within days of his return home to Florida.
In a February 2014 report, Farrago told Outside the Lines there was no sense of urgency in the locker room about Abdusalamov's condition until after the doctors left, when Farrago saw a bloody urine sample. Farrago said he didn't know where to reach the doctors. He showed Abdusalamov's handlers to the exit door and said they should find a taxi to one of the nearby hospitals, but he wasn't familiar with them.
Edelstein said Farrago's deposition also revealed that in a prefight meeting of inspectors and officials, there was no discussion of doctors, an ambulance, emergency routes or any other aspects of handling a potentially serious medical situation. "The lack of preparedness relative to the need for medical attention was 100 percent, and it was all left in the hands of the inspector, and he's preoccupied with getting and selling the wraps," Edelstein added.
Abdusalamov had a blood clot in his brain, suffered multiple strokes and has never regained the ability to walk or talk. Nearly two years after the night that tragically transformed his life, he is cared for at home by his wife. They live in Connecticut with their three young daughters, and he undergoes rehabilitation.
In June, the New York State attorney general sued five of Abdusalamov's handlers, contending that if there were insufficient care from the athletic commission's medical team, then the handlers were at fault too.
According to court filings, medical bills have surpassed $2 million for the native of the Russian Republic of Dagestan, now 34. The Ring10 charity run by Farrago contributed about $190,000 toward Abdusalamov's care, Edelstein said, with more than half of that coming from a donation by HBO, which televised the bout.
A spokesman for the New York State inspector general's office said its investigation that began the week after the fight is ongoing.