Shannon Briggs Claims Robbery, Files Lawsuit Over Fees From Klitschko Beatdown

Shannon Briggs says he was robbed: literally.

The two-time world heavyweight champion claims that he is the victim of a massive rip-off, perpetrated by his business partners and involving his last fight with WBC champion Vitali Klitschko in Hamburg, Germany, in October of 2010.

Briggs risked his health and his very life in taking one of the worst, most brutal beatings seen in boxing in recent times.

It was a 12-round shellacking in that left him bleeding and broken in a German hospital for an extended stay with a torn left bicep, a left tendon rupture and serious damage to his eyes.

Briggs' financial reward for this heroic, yet doomed effort was to have been $750,000, but Briggs now claims he came away with only $25,000.

Even his hospital bills, Briggs contends, were deducted from his overall fight purse.

In a press release, Briggs claims "that he has been a victim of a 'ripoff' on two fronts: by his former promoters and business partners, part and parcel of which includes documents in which his signature was 'forged.'"

Today, Briggs filed a major lawsuit in the New York State Supreme Court, alleging breach of fiduciary duty, conversion, unjust enrichment and breach of contract against Gregory D. Cohen, Shelly Finkel and Barry Honig, and their boxing and entertainment promotional company, Empire Sports & Entertainment.

The lawsuit states that "defendants have denied Briggs the compensation he was promised and to which he was entitled to for his services to Golden Empire, Empire and Holdings."

Briggs claims that not long after he arrived back from Germany, he was dumped by the Empire Sports & Entertainment Company of which he had been an investor and was paid only $25,000 for his trouble.