A professional wrestler who violently attacked a referee during an event on Saturday has been banned from one circuit, and he could eventually face criminal charges.
Devon Nicholson — a.k.a. “Hannibal” — had a match against “Carlito” at a World Class Pro Wrestling event in Irving, Texas, on Saturday night. After he pinned Carlito for the win, Nicholson went after referee Lando Deltoro and repeatedly stabbed him in the head with a metal spike.
It was unclear at first if the attack was part of the act, but the scene quickly took a horrifying turn. Nicholson made numerous lacerations on Deltoro and left him with blood running down his head. You can see the video below, but beware that it is graphic:
I’m not about “Cancel Culture”, but promotions need to STOP booking “Hannibal”, AKA “Blood Hunter”. There’s been numerous accusations of sexual harassment & several incidents of him legit injuring people. He’s a reckless liability that’s all about himself & getting YouTube views. pic.twitter.com/AfB2hc5LiF
— The Slop Drop (@TheSlopDrop1) December 12, 2021
Deltoro shared an update on Facebook early Sunday morning. He posted photos of the numerous lacerations he suffered, which required sutures. Deltoro said things “went a bit off script.”
“Hey guys, I’m ok things went a bit off script but I’ll live,” he wrote. “Tore an artery and lost a lot of blood and even got a new haircut. The staff at Parkland were great. Thank you all for reaching out and thank you to the friends who watched over Niki as things went down.”
A GoFundMe page has been created by a friend to help Deltoro pay for medical expenses.
Jerry Bostic, the owner of World Class Pro Wrestling, issued a video statement on Facebook on Sunday addressing the incident. He said he “cannot and will not condone what happened (on Saturday)” and that Nicholson is no longer associated with the company.
Some people who worked at the event claimed Nicholson attacking the referee and making him bleed was part of the script, but Nicholson completely crossed the line.
Nicholson, 39, has a popular YouTube channel with more than 300,000 subscribers. He will likely have trouble finding work after Saturday’s incident and may have much, much bigger problems.
