Joe Diaz
TRAGEDY HITS JOE WHILE JOE’S IN HOSPITAL
San Francisco, CA– On Cinco De Mayo (May 5) trainer Joe Diaz, now 71, was working with a couple of fighters in his Top Level Gym, which is located in Phoenix, AZ. Diaz, in the midst of legal battles (AKA millions) with the state of Arizona over their denying him a license, and Bob Arum’s Top Rank, this because of a number of issues regarding boxer “Yory Boy Campas’ abuse by the company and their agent/Arizona promoter, the currently jailed Peter McKinn, who is incarcerated for committing Felonies against both Campas and Diaz, Joe suffered a massive heart attack.
92-YEAR OLD MOM MAKES TREK FROM JERSEY TO PHOENIX
The following day, Joe’s younger sister Rosie, and his 92-year old mother Carmen Rovoy Diaz, flew from their New Jersey home to be with Joe, then still in critical condition. In the Intensive Care Unit, Mom sang Joe songs, including Happy Birthday, this coming together of the family really produced some wonderful times as Joe continued to mend, and without a doubt it helped him both physically and emotionally.
MAMA DIAZ GOT REAL SICK VISITING HER AILING SON
Then Carmen (mom) got sick and was put in a hospital within walking distance of St. Joseph’s Hospital where Diaz has been for two months now. When Rosie Diaz was giving me updates on both mother and brother, I could sense that something was not right. As it turns out, I was right as Mama Diaz passed away in a Hospice center in Phoenix in mid-June.
EMOTIONAL STORY IF THERE EVER WAS
Not knowing what to say when I would inquire on the two, Rosie would time and again say things like, “Joe is getting better, mom is not.” Earlier today, she told me that her mother had died and that she had kept it from me because she didn’t want her recovering brother to know until he was, in her mind, strong enough to handle it. Yesterday she told both Joe and then called me to tell me of her mom’s passing.
CAN’T PUT IT INTO WORDS
Joe Diaz was victimized by Top Rank and Peter McKinn, the Arizona Athletic Commission headed by the corrupt Mary Rose Wilcox and John Montano, and business in his gym went to pot. Thus at 70, Joe turned 71 recently, was forced back into working full time as a plumber in the Arizona heat. Forget the stress of the job, what Top Rank and Arizona did to Diaz, this would have caused an average person, myself included to commit Hari-Kari.
MORIARITY IN TOWN THIS WEEK
The lawyer for Diaz, Campas and others, Edward Moriarity, will be in Phoenix this week filing motions and the like. Although I obviously cannot blame Bob Arum or his cohort Peter McKinn for the death of Joe’s mom, the stress that they and the Arizona Commission put Joe Diaz under was, let me put this mildly, was both criminal and disgusting. And while I expect Diaz to successfully sue the aforementioned culprits, no amount of money will compensate for what they’ve done to him.
Pedro Fernandez