PHOTO: Kassim the Dream
Former middleweight boxing champion Kassim Ouma has been charged with felony battery after allegedly assaulting a man in Los Angeles on Friday, reports TMZ. The Ugandan-born boxer knocked a man "unconscious" after making "gay advances" on him, according to police reports.
Law enforcement sources tell us ... the former IBF junior middleweight champion is telling investigators ... he was hanging out in Hollywood early Friday morning when he struck up a conversation with a guy he just met.
Ouma says the two went back to the other man's home for a drink ... where the guy allegedly made a pass at the boxer. Ouma claims he politely declined multiple advances ... but says when he got up to leave, the guy made one final move -- and Ouma shoved him away. The altercation then escalated ... with Ouma allegedly knocking the guy out cold. Cops were called to the scene -- where the victim was treated and transported to a nearby hospital.
The boxing champ "went to the man's home for a drink." That's an interesting situation, no?
The 35-year-old Ouma was born in Uganda. Ouma has a very compelling personal story and is the subject of the 2008 documentary Kassim the Dream. He was kidnapped at 6-years-old and forced to become a child soldier for the rebel army under the leadership of Yoweri Museveni—who later become Uganda's president and has remained in that position 1986. Ouma was drafted into the army as a teenager, became a boxer in the army's amateur team and applied for political asylum in the United States when he was 18-years-old. Ouma later became the International Boxing Champion Junior Middleweight world champion.
Uganda has received worldwide attention after Museveni signed the Anti-Homosexuality Bill earlier this year. . The bill punishes same-sex relations with life imprisonment and denies bail to those accused of "aggravated homosexuality."