do you want to try the wrestling game ?

Share on Facebook

The Violent Side of Wrestling - Part III

And Mortal Van Dam returns!! Today we will continue nearing the end of the first section of this series about the violent side of wrestling where we are featuring New Jack. Let us today go back fourteen years and talk about a terrifying story that occurred during an ECW house show.

The “Mass Transit Incident”

The "Mass Transit Incident" occurred on the 23rd of November 1996 at the Wonderland Ballroom in Revere, MA during a house show held by Extreme Championship Wrestling.

Background

Ok now we should start by stating that this accident is not all New Jack’s fault but his violence is what led him to legal trouble.

Normally, when one mentions shocking wrestling events, our thoughts switch to many wrestling names but few think of a jobber named Mass Transit. Mass Transit was a kid who showed up at an ECW show along with two dwarfs and planned to fight against them in a handicap match that night as a match at the house show.

ECW’s General Manager Paul Heyman hired this guy by the name of Eric Kulas who was an untrained 17-year-old boy but looked much older due to being 6'2" and over 350 pounds.

Eric heard that Axl Rotten would not show up and convinced Paul Heyman to allow him to fill in for Axl (Axl Rotten had been scheduled to work a tag match with D-Von Dudley against The Gangstas [New Jack and Mustapha Saed]). Eric Kulas lied by saying that he had been trained by Killer Kowalski and that he was 19 year old. Kulos also bragged about his wrestling experience … Hell YEAH he had some; wrestling midgets.

Heyman was blinded by the fake ID and was unaware of the true age of Kulas and as the tricks worked, Kulas was hired.

Kulas’ gimmick was that of a stereotypical police officer/security guard. Fans did not greet him well (normal for jobbers) especially when they saw this fat kid instead of Axl Rotten. Mass Transit yelled back at them and this worked well with his bad attitude character.

During the match, D-Von and New Jack were wrestling outside the ring, while Mustafa and Transit fought inside the ring.

The match was planned to be a squash match and D-Von was quickly isolated outside the ring. The Gangstas then double teamed Kulas inside the ring, with New Jack beating the young man forcefully.

At first, New Jack hit Mass Transit with a crutch a few times, next came the guitar and a toaster was with Mass Transit suffering blows all over the head. The crowd exploded with excitement seeing Mass Transit lying across the mat. New Jack pulled Mass Transit up by the hair, and sat him up. Taking his knife, New Jack cut deeply into Transit's forehead. Much deeper than normal and Mass Transit screamed; pulling away from New Jack. Blood flowed (literally) across the mat and the ECW fans ate it up as part of plans.

New Jack then tries to scoop slam Mass Transit but, being too heavy, decides to lay him down. New Jack gets to the top turnbuckle with a chair and crashes into Mass Transit's head. Blood continued squirting out of Kulas’ head. New Jack goes for the pin, but there is no referee around. Unofficially over, the paramedics come out and try to stop the bleeding.

As more medics come out to help, Eric Kulos, bleeding very badly, New Jack grabbed the house microphone and exclaimed; "McMahon, Bischoff, look at this guy! As far as I'm concerned, that fat piece can bleed to death, because I don't give a damn."

The fans were amazed and kept screaming "Blood! Blood! Blood!" and shouted at Kulas calling him names such s “Fat” and other swearing.

Eric Kulos ended up with 50 stitches!!

This started a series of events that included New Jack's arrest and the near-cancellation of Barely Legal, ECW's impending first pay-per-view broadcast.

Barely Legal Pay-Per-View

This incident caused ECW’s Barely Legal pay-per-view to be cancelled by the provider, Request TV, on Christmas Eve of 1996.

Heyman "begged and pleaded" with Request, and was finally able to convince the company that they had been misled by Kulos’ lying and managed to get the pay-per-view placed back on the schedule on Sunday, April 13 of 1997.

Eric Kulas and his family later did an interview with Inside Edition that featured footage from the incident, including New Jack cutting him and berating him after the match. The segment was biased towards Kulas (as the beating part was a kayfabe but used as real to get a better effect on people), showing him as an innocent, unprepared victim, while blaming ECW, even going so far as to expose New Jack's criminal past.

After this interview, the Kulas family launched a lawsuit and so key details of how Kulas actually got into the match had not been made public at that point.

Three years after the incident, Jerome "New Jack" Young was tried on charges of assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, and was later sued along with ECW for physical and psychological damage by the Kulas family. The family claimed that Eric did not know he was going to be in a hardcore match, and he also claimed that he was almost killed in the ring.

ECW claimed that it was a match that got out of hand but nothing illegal had occurred.

New Jack claimed that Kulas puffed his cheeks to increase the bleeding. New Jack, claimed that his first attempts to cut Kulas did not work as Kulas had never been bladed before. When he tried again, he accidentally pushed too deep and that caused the massive bleeding.

After hearing about Eric Kulas's request to New Jack to make him "get color", a jury released Young of all charges in the criminal trial, and he was later declared not liable in the civil trial. “New Jack: Not Guilty” … and that became his new slogan which he put it on a sign on the front of a grocery cart full of weapons that he wheeled into a match.

Performers who testified at Jerome Young's trial stated that Eric Kulas was extremely arrogant and demanding backstage prior to the match. They also testified that Kulas, who was told of having to bleed as part of the match, had asked Young to perform the bladejob for him, since he had never done it before.

Another testimony stated that Stephen Kulas began berating The Gangstas and screamed, "He's only 17!" and "Take it easy on him, he's just a kid!" when they isolated his son from D-Von Dudley during the match and double-teamed him.

In the book, The Rise and Fall of ECW, one can also read that as the medic crew carried Kulas out, who was escorted by Tommy Dreamer, holding his hand to comfort him, Kulas showed the fans his middle finger to be remembered as “being the bad guy”.

Authorities later heard that Kulas had lied to Paul Heyman about his age and experience and that Stephen Kulas (his father) even vouched for his son.

In The Rise and Fall of ECW, Paul Heyman states that Kulas's dubious credentials as a student of Killer Kowalski were endorsed by a then-known midget wrestler, who was with Kulas when he and his father approached the staff about getting Eric in.

And if you had any doubt if New Jack was having fun beating to the extreme Eric, Jack himself later stated (in interviews) that after he found out about Kulas' duplicity, he didn't have any remorse for what he had done.

The Match

As already mentioned, the match was a house show and thus was not televised. Despite this, Extreme Fan Cam was present and recorded the event on a camcorder. This footage was then used as evidence for the trial.

The video footage included New Jack asking Kulas "You alright?" which prompted some to consider his actions moments later as part of the show and not representative of his true feelings.

This incident led the Gangstas to proceed to work Kulas over even more, prompting Stephen Kulas to scream, “Ring the bell. He's 17!”

New Jack’s Dream

Well, three years later, Eric Kulos died following an operation related to his weight problems whilst New Jack built new hopes for his dream; that of becoming a Hollywood star.

Well, it was not a Hollywood film that New Jack starred in but four months later, filmmaker Barry Blaustein released a highly acclaimed documentary about professional wrestling named: “Beyond the Mat” and New Jack turned in a star performance.

"I'm a very violent person," he confesses to the camera, "and I'll hurt you and it's no secret." Jack then mentions the four justifiable homicides as a bounty hunter that were mentioned in the introduction. (New Jack laughs off that statement these days by saying, "I plead the fifth on the grounds it may tend to incriminate me.")

This was Mortal Van Dam ... whilst hoping that you are finding this series of articles interesting, I appreciate your comments and hope to see you again next week with some more shocking stories!

Discuss it on the wrestling forum

Comments

  1. Comment #1

    Holy crap dude, this New Jack character has me sucked in, never heard of him before but I really wish I could have watched him perform live... Great article!

    Posted by Son Gohan on Sunday, August 29, 2010

  2. Comment #2

    I thank you for your support mates :) do not be afraid to point out any spelling mistakes (try my best to give the best English but some sentences may be broken and 1st language speakers might point out) or give me suggestions.

    I appreciate and am glad that this series is being appreciated :)

    Next week you will read about New Jack breaking a wrestler's leg with chairshots and probably even an episode when New Jack caught fire :O enjoy people and all the best in RL

    Posted by Mortal Van Dam on Sunday, August 29, 2010

  3. Comment #3

    very good series of stories u have written here they have kept me entarteand very well and
    it's nice u go for not to known stories very good job and i look frward to reading more in the near future

    Posted by the martster on Sunday, August 29, 2010

  4. Comment #4

    i used to love watching new jack wrestle. he didnt care what he used or how he would use a weapon to get the win.

    Posted by mutant freek on Monday, August 30, 2010

Leave a comment

Please Keep your comments appropriate, and PG rated at all times. Any comment that violates the game rules will be deemed spam, and won't be published.