- Tyson had an exceptionally tough upbringing
- He has admitted to crimes during his troubled youth.
Mike Tyson has confronted a man who accused the boxing icon of stealing from him when he was young, and the former baddest man on the planet showed he’s come a long way from his troubled, crime-ridden self when he reacted to the news.
Tyson, who was the undisputed world heavyweight champion from 1987 to 1990, will face YouTuber Jake Paul in Texas on Friday night.
It will be Iron Mike’s first professional fight in 19 years and the 58-year-old has spent most of this year training hard in the gym for his return to the ring.
During a Netflix show previewing the fight, Tyson returned to his hometown of Brownsville, one of New York’s toughest neighborhoods in the 1980s, and ran into a man who wanted a photo with him.
“You robbed me when I was eight years old on Amboy and Pitkin,” the man said, referring to the corner of Pitkin Avenue and Amboy Street in Brooklyn.
Tyson was shocked by the comment and asked, ‘Did I steal from you?’ before turning to the camera and saying: “Now he blames me for stealing from him.”
Mike Tyson (left), 58, will fight Jake Paul, 27, in Arlington, Texas, on Friday night.
The man replied: ‘He robbed me when I was a child, brother. Next to the Woolworth store. Do you remember Woolworth’s?
Tyson smiled and apologized to the man.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
The man smiled back, holding no grudge, and said, “No, don’t worry, darling.”
Tyson spoke about his difficult childhood in his 2013 autobiography, Mike Tyson: Undisputed Truth.
Born at Cumberland Hospital in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, in 1966, Tyson never really knew his father, Percel.
And the man her mother, Lorna Mae, told her was her “biological father,” Jimmy “Curlee” Kirkpatrick Jr., was a rare presence in both of their lives.
Boxing trainer Cus D’Amato transformed young Mike Tyson (pictured together) into a boxing phenomenon.
‘Iron Mike’ is widely considered one of the most terrifying heavyweights of all time.
Tyson became the undisputed world champion in 1988, adding The Ring and lineal titles to his collection after knocking out Michael Spinks in the first round (pictured demolishing Trevor Berbick in 1986).
When Tyson was seven, her mother had lost her job as a matron at the Women’s Detention Center in Manhattan, and she and her children had been evicted.
The future champion began a career of petty crime at the age of seven: climbing into houses through windows older children were too big to get through and stealing everything he found.
His childhood took on a relentless pace of crime waves that landed him in the police, only to be taken home and brutally beaten by his desperate mother.
By the time he was 12, he was a “stunned zombie” taking Thorazine and routinely attending a reform school or a “crazy special education school.”
Tyson can’t remember many highlights from his childhood, but one that stands out occurred during a period at Sporford Reform School.
He once recalled: “We watched a movie called “The Greatest” about Muhammad Ali. When it was over… we were shocked when Ali himself came out on stage.
“I thought, I want to be that guy.”