Posted on by bdamage1
Brian Damage
This is the 454th installment of the ‘Wrestling with Sin‘ series. A group of stories that delves into the darker, underbelly of pro wrestling. Many of the stories involve such subjects as sex, drugs, greed and in some cases even murder! As with every single story in the Sin series, I do not condone or condemn the alleged participants. We simply retell their stories by researching interviews, newspapers, magazines and various other sources of media.
HIGHjacked Honeymoon
Kerry and Cathy Adkisson were married in June of 1983. After returning from their honeymoon in Puerta Vallarta, Mexico…Kerry and Cathy were detained by custom agents at the Dallas/Fort Worth Airport. The agents discovered eighteen unmarked tablets in his right front pocket, three hundred Percodan and Codeine pills in a plastic bag in the crotch of his pants, he also had ten grams of Marijuana and 6.5 grams of an undetermined white powdery substance.
The news of the drugs and Kerry’s subsequent arrest made all the local newspapers in Texas. It forced Kerry to go on World Class TV and declare his innocence and not to believe everything you hear and read in the news. Kerry’s father Fritz, allegedly began anonymously circulating reports that the drugs were planted on Kerry…most likely from Freebird Michael Hayes. Most Von Erich fans bought that excuse and brought more heat to Hayes and the Freebirds. Ultimately, the evidence mysteriously became lost and all of the charges against Kerry were dropped.
Losing That Swagger
Jake Hager revealed that his last days in WWE as Jack Swagger caused him severe burn out. He said he was constantly on the road combined with a short, failed run as world champion added a great deal of stress on him. Hager looked at his son who was eight at the time and realized he missed most of his life being on the road. This led to a deep depression and he began drinking heavily.
Hager said his drinking got out of control and couldn’t stop. His drinking led to tension with his wife Catalina and almost broke up his family. Instead of going to rehab, Hager began training in MMA and the intense training kept him away from booze and got his mind and body back in shape.
The Original Shank
Tim Gerrard was a wrestler who competed for several territories across the country. One territory he worked for was the Original Sheik Ed Farhat’s promotion based in Detroit, Michigan. Gerrard said that working for the Sheik was extremely difficult because the travel days were long and the Sheik was very cheap. Gerrard claimed the pay was very low and that caused a lot of wrestlers to no show his events.
He recalled one night in the locker room before a show, Gerrard was made a champion and the Sheik bragged that while he didn’t pay much, he rewarded his wrestlers with title belts. Gerard then unstrapped the belt off of his waist and handed it to Sheik. He then told the Sheik, “I’d rather have the money.” This insulted the Sheik, who grabbed a pair of scissors he was bringing to the ring for his match and pointed them at Tim Gerrard. The Sheik started cursing and yelling at Gerrard calling him an ungrateful motherfucker and threatened Gerrard by saying he was going to stab Gerrard in his eye with the scissors.
Tim Gerrard had to backtrack and say he was only kidding and convinced the Sheik he was a jokester. Luckily for Gerrard, the Sheik calmed down and backed off.
El Condor has Landed
Gilberto Gonzalez Canseco was a Mexican wrestler who competed under the names of Kolo Arano and El Condor. He began his wrestling career in 1956. Canseco was small in stature only weighing 156 pounds and 5 feet 5 inches tall. Despite his small size, Canseco was said to be a tough guy in the locker room, who wouldn’t be pushed around by much larger luchadors.
In November of 1964, Canseco was booked to wrestle in El Salavdor in Central America. While out with fellow luchdor Gori Casanova, Canseco was confronted by some “fans.” There was a brief confrontation, but the two wrestlers decided to walk away from the situation before it got any worse. Unfortunately the group of fans decided to follow Canseco and Casanova to where they were staying and stabbed Canseco multiple times.
Gori Casanova was lucky to escape the attack, but sadly, Canseco died from his wounds. It was said that it took over twelve days for Canseco’s body to return to Mexico for burial due to some unscrupulous politics involved. Gilberto Canseco was just 26 years old at the time of his death. His murderers were never apprehended.