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Thiago Silva’s South Florida arrest is a gift to Las Vegas Culinary Union

By Zach Arnold | February 7, 2014

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Mugshot from Broward County, Florida Sheriff’s office

Arrest number 501400892.

One can only imagine the internal reaction at Zuffa HQ in Las Vegas Thursday night when news broke nationally about the arrest of fighter Thiago Silva in Broward County, Florida (Ft. Lauderdale).

As if the New York Post’s story about a New York lobbyist guest being a convicted level 1 sex offender wasn’t bad enough press for UFC, here comes the… ultimate… ammunition for New York politicians looking for a reason to take a pass on voting for MMA legislation.

NBC Miami reports that Silva had a standoff with local police and their SWAT unit after he allegedly went to Pablo Popovitch’s BJJ school and supposedly went on the attack.

Silva has been charged on four counts: two counts of attempted felony murder, one count of aggravated battery with deadly weapon, and one count of resisting arrest (without violence).

On the attempted felony murder charges, Florida law code 782.051(1):

(1) Any person who perpetrates or attempts to perpetrate any felony enumerated in s. 782.04(3) and who commits, aids, or abets an intentional act that is not an essential element of the felony and that could, but does not, cause the death of another commits a felony of the first degree, punishable by imprisonment for a term of years not exceeding life, or as provided in s. 775.082, s. 775.083, or s. 775.084, which is an offense ranked in level 9 of the Criminal Punishment Code. Victim injury points shall be scored under this subsection.

MMA Weekly claims the incident was motivated by a domestic dispute.

Topics: Media, MMA, UFC, Zach Arnold | 12 Comments » | Permalink | Trackback |

12 Responses to “Thiago Silva’s South Florida arrest is a gift to Las Vegas Culinary Union”

  1. Jason says:

    If you’re using this as a reason to not allow MMA in your state, then you never wanted it there anyway. Silva is responsible for his own actions. The UFC will cut him and I don’t expect to hear much more. Was the NFL responsible for Aaron Hernandez’s behavior, no. If anyone blames the UFC for Thiago Silva’s action, then they’re an idiot anyway.

    • Chuck Finley's Dong says:

      Rae Carruth also tried to hire someone to kill his girlfriend, if memory holds. Bad people do bad things regardless of their professional occupation

  2. 45 Huddle says:

    Well he did look like a criminal with all of those neck tattoos. Now he has the rap sheet to back it up.

    He is a multiple time drug offender who should have been cut after his last offense. Serves the UFC tight to now have thos hanging over their head.

  3. jo says:

    If you want to have a good laugh, check out the ESPN “article” on this. Nobody’s going dare to go there, but you have to wonder how big of part brain trauma plays in this.

    • 45 Huddle says:

      You never know how much it played a factor in it.

      A football player committed suicide in the last few years. They examined his brain and found that the head trauma he got contributed to his suicide.

      The same was also likely for Chris Benoit. He went mental after too many concussions.

      Silva was already a thug. Add in brain damage and it is a recipe for disaster.

      • jo says:

        My thoughts exactly, 45. Not only that, roids, a traumatic childhood, and drugs. Dude was a ticking time bomb.

      • david m says:

        Why do you say he was a thug? He had never been arrested before. You are conflating looks with reality.

        • 45 Huddle says:

          Looks is reality. 70% of how we communicate is through nonverbal cues. This guy walked and talked like a thug. Got tattoos to match his personality. Had a drug problem. And now finalized it by putting a gun to a woman’s mouth.

  4. Jonathan says:

    45 Huddle,

    He very much looks like a criminal.

    He should fit right in in jail.

  5. david m says:

    If Thiago is able to in fact fight again, I wonder if he will get a TRT exemption; surely his body won’t be able to produce testosterone after the stress of being arrested.

  6. simon says:

    Both Attempted Murder charges were dropped, as it should be. If you watched that hearing, his defense attorney rightfully argued that the State was simply making assumptions and were essentially acting like they were witness to what happened, when that wasn’t the case at all.

    Apparently the officer who wrote the report came off as if he was aware of Silva’s profession as a trained multi-discliplined martial artist and made it seem like if Silva had the chance (He did apparently) he could have murdered the shit out of his wife and everyone in the gym (He didn’t, of course).

    This is not the first time a sports star has flipped out and committed a crime. He’s going to spend some time in jail as he should, but there were bigger stars in bigger sports who took things to a much higher level in terms of type of crime committed. As someone mentioned already, Silva is responsible for his own actions.

    It says more about the government body who won’t allow a huge economic injection of cash from the revenue generated by a new and exciting sport than it does about the UFC and its fighters.

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