The plaintiffs who allege that the May 2nd superfight in Las Vegas between Floyd Mayweather Jr. and Manny Pacquiao was a fraud and deserve compensation will argue their cases in front of a federal judge in California, according to a report by the Associated Press.
Judge R. Gary Klausner, the same judge who heard the arguments of the cases brought against the Sony movie studio related to a computer hack last year, will decide whether the case should be granted class-action status before any trial proceeds.
A panel of judges will decide whether to consolidate similar claims brought in different jurisdictions into a single courtroom ruled last Friday that several lawsuits in several states will be heard in the Central District of California where Pacquiao was said to have injured his right shoulder in training.
Pacquiao arrived in Los Angeles to begin training for the Mayweather fight on March 1st. The Filipino superstar apparently suffered the injury three-four weeks before the bout was scheduled to take place, which means the injury could have taken place between April 4 – April 11.
The U.S. Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation said in its decision that the determination of the severity and the timing of the rotator cuff injury could require “significant factual, and possibly expert discovery.”
According to MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia, torn rotator cuff surgery recovery can take three to six months, depending on the size of the tear and other factors. Considering Pacquiao was raising his arms in the air at the conclusion of the fight, eyebrows have certainly been raised about how severe the shoulder injury really was – if legitimate at all.
In mid-May alone, at least 32 lawsuits were filed in California, Nevada, Florida, Illinois, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, and Texas. The lawsuits aren’t just confined to the United States, either.
Abbas Kazerounian, one of the founding partners at Kazerouni Law Group, APC, is a lawyer who is licensed to practice law in more than four U.S. states and sued Pacquiao and the fight promoters for failing to disclose Pacquiao’s injury until after the fight.
“People are not happy about this. I do feel that people were ripped off and defrauded,” Kazerounian said.
Pacquiao and promoter Top Rank, are all named in the lawsuits. Mayweather is named in most of the lawsuits, along with his promoters and cable companies HBO and Showtime.
Attorneys representing Pacquiao and Top Rank have stated the claims are without merit.
An attorney for the defendants declined to comment on Monday, as well as representatives for HBO and Showtime. Attempts to reach Mayweather’s promoter by phone and email were also unsuccessful.
Mayweather-Pacquiao generated more than $500 million in total revenue, including 4.4 million U.S. pay-per-view buys, the most lucrative match in boxing history.
Floyd Mayweather made a career-high of $220 million while Pacquiao made a career-high of $180 million.
