Missing From Boxing Press For Decades, Top Super Lightweight Steve Hearon is Located
By Robert Brizel, Head Real Combat Media Boxing Correspondent
From Carlos Monzon to Clifford Etienne to James Page, some highly regarded boxers inside the ring, in life emerge outside the ring as nonfunctional in society in the long run.
Such is the still ongoing strange case of former World Boxing council number one ranked super lightweight contender Steve Hearon 24-4 with 18 knockouts from Houston, Texas, also known as John Davis Jr. Hearon rose up in the Hoover Street Gym in Los Angeles, California, best known as the home gym of Mando Ramos and Rodolfo Gonzalez.
His last eight pro bouts were scheduled for ten, and Hearon won the first six, and lost the last two. In September 1983, Hearon was stopped in the fifth round by 22-1 Lupe Aquino in the fifth round at Harrah’s Marina Hotel Casino in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on a nasty cut. Hearon prematurely reentered the ring in November 1983 before the Aquino bout cut had fully healed, and wound up getting stopped by 2-3 journeyman Eduardo Dominguez at Caesars Palace Sports Pavilion in Las Vegas, Nevada, when the Aquino cut reopened. Hearon was the number one mandatory challenger for World Boxing Council Super Lightweight champion Bruce Curry at the time, and never got his shot.
Hearon was arrested in 1984 by the FBI in Atlanta for three unsolved murders which linked to Hill due to improved fingerprint technology. Hearon was convicted of the February 1976 murder in 48-year-old William Brownell, and the October 1978 murder of 48-year-old Claude Hill. Hill was also tried in the January 1976 murder of another man, Roland Craig, but the case was dismissed for insufficient evidence twice in 1977. It turns out Hearon’s real name was john Davis Jr., and he had escaped from prison in Colorado, and became a boxer under the alias of Steve Hearon, a name he has kept to this day.
Despite the murders, Hearon was eventually released. In February 2004, he was arrested for assault. From that point on, Hearn vanishes from the map. Amazingly, California.gov CDCR inmate locator revealed Hearon, age 68, is still alive, and is currently incarcerated at California State facility at Corcoran, which he was moved to in July 2004. This implies Hearon was convicted after being rearrested in 2004, and never got out again. Hearon was eligible for parole in January 2019, but may have had his parole hearing postponed to the effects of the COVID-19 Novel Coronavirus pandemic. The website states the parole date stated is subject to change. This is the first time in nearly 40 years Hearon has been found.
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