MMA Fighter With Down Syndrome Takes Fight to Court

by Christina Hernandez from NBC Miami:
A 24-year-old MMA fighter with Down Syndrome is taking his fight to court after the Florida Boxing Commission said he can't compete in a sanctioned fight.

While the boxing commission says Garrett Holeve can train and take part in exhibitions, where there is no score kept, it will not allow the Cooper City fighter to take part in an actual competition.

"He didn't understand why he's not allowed to compete," said his father, Mitchell Holeve. "He understands he has Down syndrome, but he doesn't feel like it's stopped him from competing, and yeah, he was very depressed."

He said when his son got the news in August, he was so upset that it took him weeks to get back to the gym.

"I was disappointed," Garrett Holeve said. "I was crying."

Mitchell Holeve said his son has lived his entire life without letting Down Syndrome get in the way, training like any other MMA fighter.

"People see his work ethic and they see how much he wants it and that kind of attracts them to him," he said. "They respect the effort that he puts in."

The fighter has even found an equally-matched opponent to go up against -- Special Olympian David Stephen from Nebraska who has monoplegic cerebral palsy.

Now, the Holeves said they are prepared to take the fight to court, by suing the Florida Boxing Commission to court for discrimination.

"He's trained like any other MMA fighter is trained," attorney Amanda Heystek said. "Garrett is trained to compete."

Calls from NBC 6 to the Florida Boxing Commission were not returned.

Florida Law Cancels Bout Between Two MMA Fighters with Disabilities

by WINK CBS News:

A controversial Mixed Martial Arts fight between two fighters living with disabilities is canceled just minutes before the match.

One of the fighters has down syndrome and the other cerebral palsy. The state stepped in and shut it down claiming it was unsanctioned. On of the fighter's fathers say it's discrimination.

That fight was set to take place at the Seminole Casino in Immokalee. It's something both of these men told me on Friday was a dream come true. Now they are fighting to find a way back into the ring.

It was a fight that was supposed to be a first of its kind. One both Garrett Holeve, 23, and David Steffin, 28, had been dreaming of, but five minutes before the first punch, the state presented the promoter with a cease and desist letter.

"He cried. It genuinely upset him," says Mitch Holeve, Garrett's father. "He's worked eight weeks in a training camp, training four and a half hours a day for eight weeks getting mentally and physically prepared to do this."

Garrett has Downs syndrome and his opponent David has cerebral palsy. The fight was supposed to happen because the match was being held on tribal land, but a letter from the DBPR says the scheduled bout between the two amateur fighters is unsanctioned and against Florida Law.

"He's upset because he knows he's being told he can't fight because he has Down syndrome and that hurts his feelings and that angers him" says Holeve.
A representative with the World Fighting Organization tells WINK News, "the safety of the fighters is our number one priority and he doesn't think the decision was made on the basis of discrimination, but solely on fighter safety."

Holeve says his son got medical clearance and show have been able to fight. "I think their decision was pretty arbitrary, discriminatory," says Holeve.

"We have two guys with disabilities and we don't want them to fight here. This is his life and they're stopping him. As his dad I am just going to make sure he can do it safely and his rights are infringed upon and I'm not stopping anywhere until that happens."                    

Holeve is talking to the Boxing Commission and he says he has also reached out to the National Down Syndrome Society.

Garrett Holeve, an MMA Fighter With Down Syndrome, Is on His Way to Changing the Sport

 

By Chris Sweeney from the Broward Palm Beach Times:

"I'm dangerous," 23-year-old Garrett Holeve warns as he bounces around a bedroom in his parents' suburban, single-story house, throwing punches and kicks. A pungent combination of protein-powered farts, dirty laundry, and ball sweat permeates the air.

"I'll hurt a guy real bad," Garrett brags. "I'll be covered in too much blood, and I'll keep hurting him. Kick him in the mouth so hard the mouth guard flies out."

The words don't roll off his tongue. They bunch up in his throat and pour out in a slurred manner that's difficult to understand. This is just one of the ways Garrett's Down syndrome manifests itself.

"Oh, umm," he stammers frequently when looking for an answer. "Finding a fight takes time. My friend Chris is going to get me a fight."

He carries other telltale physical characteristics of the genetic condition: small ears that look like half-hearts, almond-shaped eyes, wide hands with short fingers, and a small, round mouth. Further affecting his health is rheumatoid arthritis that afflicts his right knee.

Garrett stands five feet tall and weighs 136 pounds. But he can drop to 125 pounds in a few days to make weight for his beloved sport, mixed martial arts. His black wifebeater reveals the tattoo of a black Punisher skull engulfed in black flames near his left shoulder. His neck and arms are solid muscle, large enough to make clear that his fists could permanently alter the alignment of an opponent's nose.

Here, in a modest home in one of Cooper City's gated communities, the floor is littered with kettlebells, a curl bar, a medicine ball, dumbbells, and two towel-covered milk crates that serve as makeshift pushup stands. Framed on the wall is the white tape in which MMA megastar Tito Ortiz wrapped his wrists for a recent Las Vegas fight. There's a poster of sharks, pictures of a half-dozen other professional fighters, and some torn-out pages of a Hooter's calendar featuring bikini-clad butts.

Playing on the flat-screen TV set is a DVD of Garrett's first exhibition bout earlier this year against a guy named Antonio Martin at Seminole Immokalee Casino. The crowd roars when Garrett throws a spinning backfist, but back in his room, the young man isn't paying attention. He's kneeing an imaginary opponent in the face before dropping to his knees to pound the thin, smelly air into submission. He then lifts his shirt and flexes his abs, a solid undefined wall of muscle padded by pasty white flesh. "This is the new me," he says enthusiastically.