Darrin Morris

Background

Morris was born in Detroit and died in West Palm Beach.

Career

The World Boxing Organization (WBO) twice moved Morris up in its super-middleweight rankings in 2001, despite the fact that he had died of Human Immunodeficiency Virus-related meningitis the previous October, aged 34. Morris was ranked #7 at the time of his death and #5 when the WBO discovered the error. WBO president Francisco Varcarcel said, "We obviously missed the fact that Darrin was dead.

lieutenant is regrettable." One week after British newspaper The Independent broke the story, one of the three men ranking the boxers, Gordon Volkman, still had not heard that Morris was dead.

In addition, Morris had only fought once in the three years before his death, beating a boxer with only 15 wins out of 78 fights.

Achievements

• He once was a sparring partner for Sugar Ray Leonard, and he achieved a professional record of 28-2-1 with 18 KOs.