The family of a student fatally injured in a charity boxing match are suing for £200,000, claiming he would have survived if the ref stopped the match.
Jubal Reji Kurian died on March 29, 2023, four days after he collapsed in the ring towards the end of the third and final round of an amateur boxing fight at Nottingham’s Harvey Haddon Sports Centre.
Jubal, a 23-year-old postgraduate student at Nottingham University, fell after suffering a blow to the head, London’s High Court heard, and never regained consciousness before he died in hospital.
Now his father, Reji Kurian, has launched a £200,000 damages claim over the tragedy, suing Ultra Events Ltd – as the organisers of the fight – on grounds that the fight should have been stopped before it was too late.
But the company is denying all liability, insisting that the officiating referee was highly competent and experienced, and therefore fully able to supervise an amateur bout comprising three two-minute rounds.
Mr Kurian had moved to the UK six months before his death to study for a master’s degree in sports medicine, hoping ultimately to become an NHS physiotherapist.
During an inquest into his death in 2024, a coroner heard that he appeared to be competing well in the fight before the tide turned in the final round, during which he suffered massive injuries.
The student’s parents flew from the United Arab Emirates to Nottingham, but his life support was turned off, and he died four days after the fight.
The family is now fighting for compensation from Ultra Events Ltd, with their barrister Harry Trusted telling the High Court last week that the referee should have stopped the fight before the ‘final punch.’
‘My case boils down to saying that, if that punch had not been delivered, Mr Kurian would have survived,’ he told the judge, Master John Dagnall, during a pre-trial hearing in London.
The family has accepted that the case could only be successful ‘if a sufficient level of carelessness is demonstrated by the defendants’.
For Ultra Events Ltd, barrister Daniel Tobin said the company denies liability, telling the judge that Mr Kurian had gone through ‘more than 33 hours of training in a local boxing gym’ before the bout, with that training provided by coaches acting for Ultra Events.
‘Boxing is a full contact sport which carries with it a high risk of serious injury,’ he added.
In order for Mr Kurian’s family’s claim to succeed, his legal team will have to establish a ‘very high degree of carelessness’ by the organisers, which Mr Tobin insisted was completely absent.
The case reached court in the preliminary stage of an action that is due to reach trial next year, with lawyers arguing about what evidence should be heard by the future trial judge.
The family’s barrister asked for permission to call expert evidence from a seasoned amateur and pro referee with over 40 years’ experience in the sport, who can analyse and comment on the video footage of the three rounds boxed.
But Ultra Events’ barrister, objecting to the evidence, said the expert proposed by Mr Trusted has no niche knowledge about the rules and regulations of white-collar boxing, nor any medical expertise to offer as insight.
After a short hearing, the judge agreed to permit the evidence to be heard at the trial, although Ultra Events will also have the option of calling their own expert witness.
An inquest held into Mr Kurian’s death was held in June 2024, with the coroner ruling that he died by accident due to bleeding on both sides of the brain.
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