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TagsIt's been a year since New Jersey boxing champ, Arturo "Thunder" Gatti was found dead in Brazil and the 37-year-old man's family continues to insist his widow is their prime suspect, the Jersey Journal reported.
Gatti's family members have entered into a new battle with the Canadian athlete's widow over his $6 million estate that Fabrizio Gatti wants his brother's two children to inherit.
The family says they suspect Amanda Rodrigues, Gatti's wife, with good reason. They allege a neighbor heard her scream, "Come to Brazil," a neighbor reportedly heard Rodrigues scream at Gatti, "You're going to see what I'm going to do to you."
After Gatti arrived in Brazil to vacation with his Brazilian wife and their 10-month-old son he was found dead in a hotel room in Ipojuca, Pernambuco with his wife's 48-inch purse strap wrapped around his neck.Rodrigues, 24, was initially charged with first degree murder and could not explain how she spent more than 10 hours in the hotel room without realizing her husband was dead. But on July 30, authorities ruled Gatti's death a suicide and Rodrigues was cleared.
The family, unsatisfied with the findings of the Brazilian police, hired an independent pathologist to perform a second autopsy in Quebec and on August 1, the pathologist found that Brazilian authorities overlooked bruises on Gatti's body during the initial autopsy. No charges have been brought against Gatti's widow at this time.
After Canadian citizen's death, Brazilian police released new details about their investigation, explaining that Gatti was hanged with a bag strap from a wooden staircase column more than two meters off the ground, the Associated Press reported.
A police spokeswoman from the northeastern city of Recife told the AP that investigators originally thought Gatti had been strangled because his body was found on the floor. The original autopsy indicated that Gatti was hanging from the column for about three hours. Despite those findings, no charges have ever been brought against Gatti's widow.
The Jersey Journal reported that Gatti's kid brother Fabrizio told the New York Daily News that Gatti had everything to live for and he was one of the most courageous men he knew, and the theory that Gatti, 37, hung himself in a Brazilian hotel room on July 11, 2009 is entirely off base.
"For his kids, growing up, I don't want them to think, 'My father is a coward who left me to grow up all alone,'" an anguished Fabrizio Gatti told the Daily News. "I'm going to find a way to prove it, that he didn't kill himself."
Gatti became boxing world champion when he challenged and beat IBF world super featherweight champion, Tracy Harris Patterson the adopted son of Floyd Patterson in December 1995. (116-111, 115-112, 114-113). That win sealed an HBO boxing deal for the Italy born boxer.
Gatti, who was born in Italy and raised in Montreal, turned professional at the age of 19 and went on to win two world-boxing titles before retiring in 2007 with a record of 40-9.
— ALICIA CRUZ, NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
