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Pavlik suffers seizure at hearing
By Kalea Hall
CANFIELD
Kelly Pavlik’s family said the former boxer was admitted to St. Elizabeth Boardman Health Center after he had a seizure on his way into a courtroom.
He had just walked into Mahoning County Area Court here Friday when he started to make guttural noises and suddenly collapsed.
He started shaking and was immediately assisted by Mahoning County deputies and family members who were with him until emergency personnel arrived.
He was told, “Breathe, Kelly, breathe.”
“We were walking into court and everything was fine,” said Atty. Damian Billak, Pavlik’s lawyer.
When Pavlik was being directed to where to sit, however, Billak said he “could tell something was off.”
“He wasn’t really responding [to me],” Billak said.
He was taken by ambulance to St. Elizabeth about 11 a.m.
“He is doing better,” his mother, Debbie Pavlik, said late Friday afternoon.
“He’s doing a little better,” she said when asked about his status late Friday evening, but she declined to comment further.
A St. Elizabeth spokeswoman declined to provide any information as to the former boxer’s condition.
Pavlik was to appear in court for a pretrial hearing on a petty-theft charge to which he originally pleaded not guilty in a written court appearance in September. Billak said Pavlik was on his way to plead to an amended charge of disorderly conduct.
There is a plea-agreement hearing scheduled for 9 a.m. Feb. 28 in Canfield.
“The goal and the focus here is just to get him better and get him back on his feet,” Billak said.
This was the third attempt at a pretrial hearing for the 31-year-old former middleweight boxing champion. Two others were continued.
A cab driver accused Pavlik of failing to pay a $25 fare in the early hours of Sept. 18 after he was taken to his Canfield home from a bar on South Meridian Road.
Pavlik also was charged in Austintown with operating a vehicle while impaired and refusing to take a breath-analysis test in December. His pretrial hearing for that charge is set at 1 p.m. March 17 in Mahoning County Area Court in Austintown.
In July 2013, Pavlik told The Vindicator a seizure he had in December 2012 somewhat played a role in his decision to retire in January 2013.
In 12 years as a boxer, he had a career record of 40-2 with 34 of his victories coming by knockout, and he received the title of middleweight world champion in 2007.