Rubin Carter

Rubin Carter

Rubin Carter was an Canadian-American middleweight boxer. He was born in the year, 1937 on May 6. He had passed away in the year, 2014 on April, 20. He has been a successful boxer and his life was highly controversial especially because of the incidents he were linked to as well as the rough childhood which he had gone through.

He was born in New Jersey in Clifton and was the fourth child of his parents. He had admitted later that he had a very strained and a troubled relationship with his father. Carter when he was 11 years old was sentenced to juvenile reformatory for an assault and for stabbing a man. According to him, the man had tried to assault him sexually and it was because of self defence that he had stabbed the man. The life of Carter from his childhood days were troubled. In the year, 1954, Carter had escaped the reformatory and later had joined the United States Army.

Carter was then sent to West Germany after he had completed his infantry basic training after some months in the Fort Jackson which was in South Carolina. When Carter was in Germany, he had started boxing for the United States Army. Later he was said to be unfit for service and after this incident he returned back home in New Jersey and then was convicted of mugging which led to him go to jail again.

Despite of the rough childhood and early years of his life, Carter was seen to change his life and emerge as being one of the most successful boxers in the country. Carter had become this professional boxer after he was released from the prison in the year, 1961. Carter was seen to be shorter when compared to the average middleweight however he had fought at around 70-72 kgs all his professional boxing career. He had an extremely aggressive style and had a great punching power which had drawn the attention of the people and also established him as the favourite of the crowd and also helped him earning the nickname which was “Hurricane”. He was seen defeat many popular and great middleweight contenders like Holley Mins, George Benton and many other famous professional boxers.

Carter had many achievements under his belt. He was seen to get an honorary championship title belt in the year, 1993 from World Boxing Council. He was also seen to be inducted into New Jersey Boxing Hall of Fame in the year, 2005 in October. He had also received two Doctorates of Law from different universities, one from the Griffith University which is in Brisbane, Australia and the other is York University in Toronto, Canada.

However, it had been seen that his career had been cut short by the murder conviction that had taken place in New Jersey. He became the international cause celebre and was imprisoned for about 19 years however the charges that were put against him was dismissed. He still died in his house in Toronto at the age of 76. The cause of his death is said to be prostate cancer.

In the year, 1966 on June, 17, a deadly scene had taken place at the Lafayette Bar and Grill in New Jersey. It was reported that two men had entered and the opened dire on the workers and the patrons inside. It was said that a single shotgun had blasted to the lower back of the bartender of the bar named James Oliver which had killed him during that time. There was another customer who was 60 years old named Fred Nauyoks who also died after being shot in his right ear. Hazel Tanis, was another customer who was present in that bar had died after a month. This lady was shot many times that too at close range by an unidentified man who was carrying the gun. After this shooting, the customer, Tanis and also another customer had survived this deadly attack that had taken place and according to their claims, the two shooters who had shot and killed people were Black.

It had been seen that despite of not having any proper evidence against John Artis, who was a close friend of Carter and Rubin Carter to this attack, both of them had been convicted by the judge of first-degree murder.  This case was highly dependent on the two eyewitnesses who said that they were the ones present in that area and then changed their statements stating that it was Artis and Carter who were the shooters in that incident that had led all the jury to have convicted both the men.

The witness had later withdrew their statements in the year, 1974 that had led to him facing a retrial. It had been seen that Carter had spent around 19 years for the crime that he had not commit. However, after this incident, Carter had taken a Canadian citizenship and had become a motivational speaker and had also become the Executive Director of Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted. This story had inspired many people and this had led him to gain a huge support from the public. He came put with his own book “The Sixteenth Round: From Number 1 Contender to Number 45472” that presented his side of the story.

This incident had inspired the movie, The Hurricane which came out in the year, 1999 and the actor who played Carter, Denzel Washington had earned the nomination for Academy Award for the Best Actor for his role portrayed in the film. This movie was acclaimed worldwide and covers the trials, accusation and the time he spends in jail. Famous singer, Bob Dylan also supported him and came up with a song which spoke about his life.

The life of Rubin Carter is a roller coaster ride with full of ups and downs. He had mostly lead a tragic life since his childhood and has been a victim of racism where he was falsely convicted because he was a Black man. However, justice was served and he finally was released. It can be seen that he was a pride of the country and has many achievements under his name.