(Editor’s note: Story updated at 4:30 p.m. ET on May 7, 2023, to reflect Ferguson was released on his own recognizance.)
Tony Ferguson is in the news again, and not for anything good.
The former UFC interim lightweight champion was arrested early Sunday for DUI in Hollywood, Calif., after he allegedly crashed his truck into two cars parked outside a nightclub. Police records show he was arrested at 2 a.m. and booked into the Hollywood Community Police Station several hours later. Bond was originally set at $30,000, but Ferguson was released at 12:12 local time on his own recognizance. The news first was reported by TMZ.
A police spokeswoman Sunday told MMA Junkie that Ferguson’s arrest came after the truck he allegedly was driving ran into two parked vehicles, then overturned. There were two occupants inside the truck when it overturned, but fire department responders were able to pull them out without major injuries, the spokeswoman said.
Los Angeles’ KTLA-TV news reported the truck ran into four parked vehicles, not two, in the 1400 block of Wilcox Avenue, and that one person was injured and transported to a hospital in unknown condition.
Ferguson’s management team declined comment Sunday when reached by MMA Junkie.
Ferguson is facing a misdemeanor DUI charge, as well as other potential charges because he reportedly refused to take a field sobriety test.
The crash resulted in the truck being flipped on its side. According to the site, Ferguson was “very uncooperative” when he was taken into custody. Video provided to TMZ from the scene shows a two truck operator flipping a truck back onto all four wheels after having come to rest atop two cars.
One of the cars, according to TMZ, belongs to a rapper named Cash Gotti, who came outside to find his Mercedes likely totaled.
In 2019, Ferguson’s wife filed a restraining order against him in what she later said was an attempt to get him mental health help. She alleged he claimed he was being tracked through a chip inserted into his body during a surgery, among other things. She dropped the restraining order the following month.
Ferguson has lost five straight fights. At one point, from 2015-2020, Ferguson won nine post-fight bonuses in nine fights, including a double bonus for a win over Edson Barboza. The only fight he didn’t win a bonus in during that stretch was when he beat Kevin Lee for the interim lightweight title.
Ferguson later was stripped of that belt when he couldn’t defend it due to injury, but he went on to beat Anthony Pettis and Donald Cerrone in consecutive Fight of the Night winners before his slump started.
Three years ago this weekend, Ferguson was knocked out by Justin Gaethje in an interim title fight. After that, he dropped consecutive decisions to Charles Oliveira and Beneil Dariush, and in 2022 was knocked out by Michael Chandler with a vicious front kick one year ago to the date, then submitted by Nate Diaz this past September.
