According to several reports at the time, Muhammad Ali rushed to a Los Angeles building on January 19, 1981, to save a man who was standing on the ledge of a fire escape, prepared to take his own life. The man was reportedly a veteran of the Vietnam War.
It is worth noting that the incident took place a day before the first inauguration of Ronald Reagan as the 40th president of the United States of America.
One of the most distinguished reports on the incident came from Terry Drinkwater, a veteran of CBS Network.
You can watch a revisiting of the report conducted by the network in 2016 that showed original footage from the incident. The video shows the man standing on the ledge of a Los Angeles building as Terry Drinkwater lets viewers know what he said and how Muhammad Ali talked him down.
Watch the full video below:
Podcaster suggests Muhammad Ali could have staged the incident
In a January 2019 episode of the What Really Happened podcast, sponsored by Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson, film-maker and storyteller Andrew Jenks spilled the findings of an investigation that he conducted into the Ali incident for over three years.
Jenks revealed that Muhammad Ali’s close friend and personal photographer Howard Bingham was present at the scene when the man tried to plummet to his death and had called the legendary boxer. Muhammad Ali was there within minutes, rolling up in his Rolls-Royce.
On the podcast, Jenks suggested six possibilities that could have been the reality.
Muhammad Ali’s refusal to be drafted into the military and choosing to be a conscientious objector to the Vietnam War is a well-known story that he’d reiterated in multiple interviews at that time.
While on one hand, he was found guilty of draft evasion and faced up to five years in prison, on the other hand, it made him an icon for the counterculture generation who vividly opposed the war.
Listen to the full podcast below:
0 votes
