
Originally Posted by
Impulsive
It tells the story of Rufino Dos Santos, a catch wrestler who challeged Carlos Gracie, who then tried to escape the challenge by trying to make Rufino wear suit and tie during the match and ridicilous stuff like that. Rufino then proceeded to defeat Carlos after which the Gracie brothers jumped him outside of his workplace 3 on 1 and beat him with weapons and broke his arm, resulting in career ending injuries. Gracies ended up getting convicted to 2 years in prison.
Allegedly, Carlos escaped the ring to avoid a bad situation and jumped the restart with a guillotine. He then claimed that Dos Santos tapped, which was denied by Dos Santos and the ref made another restart.
Regards the prison, the Gracies were well connected politically and it appears that they did not serve any actual time. They had already previously attacked and injured Carlos's former teacher Donato Pires.
From Wikipedia:
The match, which was the only professional bout in Carlos's life,[3] finally took place on the promised day. During the first two five-minute rounds, Rufino dominated the bout,[3] forcing Carlos to defend from his guard and at one point even hit illegal strikes that were admonished by the referee.[4]
At the third, Rufino passed his guard and locked a submission hold, which Gracie avoided by diving out of the ring through the ropes. The referee ordered the match to be restarted on the center of the ring, but Gracie locked a guillotine choke in the process, causing turmoil.[4] Carlos claimed Rufino had tapped out while his opponent denied it, so the judges deliberated for some time and decided to solve the argument by restarting the match. However, Gracie refused to fight, insisting he had already won, and thus Rufino was declared winner.[3]
The conflict then moved to the newspapers, where Rufino critized Carlos's skill and dismissed his jiu-jitsu credentials, leading Carlos, George and Hélio to assault him in front of his teaching place at the Tijuca Tênis Clube on October 18. They hit him repeatedly with a steel bar and immobilized him for Carlos to apply an armlock, dislocating his shoulder so badly that it needed surgery.[4][1]
This time the brothers were arrested and were convicted to two years and a half in prison for assault, as well as for trying to run away during the arrest, but their connections to President of Brazil Getúlio Vargas granted them a pardon.[3]
Like many people, there are Gracie's that have done some stupid stuff. Brazil at that time was under a dictatorship so "mafia" or "gangster" mentality was very common. In parts of America this was also true during Prohibition years and even in modern times, many people can't walk away from an insult, even though it is just words and not facts.