Shreveport has a legendary history with professional wrestling, but Louisiana at large was once a hotbed for wrestling events. During the heyday of wrestling in the 80s, one WWE Hall of Famer was sued in Monroe, Louisiana, after getting in a fight with a fan at a show.


 

  • Mid-South Wrestling was a legendary professional wrestling company running shows across the south
    • Mid-South was later bought out by WWE
  • This Mid-South Wrestling star went on to become a legend and Hall of Famer in WWE

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Louisiana Wrestling Legend: Hacksaw Jim Duggan

Jim Duggan, a.k.a. Hacksaw, is a retired professional wrestler who wrestled for WWE and now-defunct wrestling companies across the South. Duggan originally had intended his athletic career to be in football, having a short run with the Atlanta Falcons before being let go due to injuries. Duggan's work with Mid-South Wrestling saw him wrestle matches across Louisiana, according to pro-wrestling database cagematch.net, Duggan wrestled at least 316 matches in Louisiana from 1982 to his full-time retirement.

Duggan once appeared at the Louisiana State Fair in Shreveport to interfere in a match, his master plan was to get his way into the ring? He dressed as a gorilla and took photos with kids in the crowd until he got a chance to jump into the ring and reveal it was Hacksaw the whole time.

Flashback To The Monroe Civic Center Sometime in the 80s

It was a night like any other for the Mid-South Wrestling stars, a show at the Monroe Civic Center like they had done several times before. Hacksaw Jim Duggan was booked in a match against the man later known as The Million Dollar Man Ted DiBiase that night but after the match Duggan writes in his book, "We were both bloody and panting" before the fans in the audience tried to get as close to ringside as possible.

Duggan says after he stepped out of the ring "a fan clipped me with his fist. I reached back to get the guy--but his old man sitting next to him got a good shot on me. I hit the guy twice and down he went." The man was identified as Donald Sills with his younger brother Victor Caldwell of Monroe, Louisiana. Sills would go on to sue both Jim Duggan and Mid-South Sports, requesting damages due to Sills' injured eye socket.

In reality, the court found that another fan had been the one to throw a cup of ice that hit Duggan in the head, but the cup was thrown from the same section as Sills and it seems Duggan identified the wrong attacker when he entered the crowd to get his offense in.

Photo by WWE on YouTube/Canva
Photo by WWE on YouTube/Canva
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Duggan was eventually forced to pay $25,432 in damages but appealed the judgment requesting the court reevaluate the case as Duggan stood on the belief Sills had started the altercation. The appeal was denied in 1989 as the court found they had properly evaluated the case and there was no room for an appeal.

That's where the case seems to end, leaving us to assume Duggan and his employer Mid-South Sports paid the damages to the fan, which after inflation is equal to $63,651.60 in today's dollars.

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