1. Stanley Ketchel
The ‘Michigan Assassin’ became world middleweight champion in 1907 and even boxed Jack Johnson for the world heavyweight title in 1909. He was then tragically gunned down the following year, still very much in his prime at 24 years of age.
2. Battling Siki
Born in Senegal but based in France, Siki won the world light-heavyweight title in 1922, beating Georges Carpentier in six rounds. He was later stabbed and hospitalised two days after a 1925 win over Jimmy Francis, before being shot and killed later that year. He was 28.
3. Vernon Forrest
Former WBC and IBF welterweight champion Vernon Forrest was most famous for defeating Shane Mosley twice in 2002. Seven years later, still only 38, he was killed by robbers at a gas station.
4. Hector Camacho
‘Macho’ Camacho was a three-weight world champion who held WBC titles at super-featherweight and lightweight, as well as the WBO version at junior-welterweight. In 2012, he was shot in the jaw while sitting in a car in Bayamón, Puerto Rico, and later passed away. He was 50.
5. Al ‘Bummy’ Davis
Davis was a popular Brooklyn native who became a contender at both lightweight and welterweight, beating the likes of Tony Canzoneri and Bob Montgomery. He was killed by four armed robbers who attacked the bar he owned in 1945. He was 25.
6. Tyrone Everett
Philadelphia southpaw Everett won 36 of his first 37 pro fights before, in 1977, he was shot and killed by his girlfriend after she came home and found him with a transvestite. Everett was only 24.
7. Oscar Bonavena
Bonavena fought Muhammad Ai, Joe Frazier, Floyd Patterson and George Chuvalo and was known for his durability. In 1976, however, the Argentinean, just 33, was shot dead by a security guard at the Mustang Ranch near Reno, Nevada following a dispute with the owner.
8. Bill Brennan
Heavy-handed Brennan finished 49 of his 52 pro wins by knockout and fought Jack Dempsey for the world heavyweight title in 1920. Four years later, Brennan, then 30, was shot and killed by street thugs outside the bar he owned in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan.
9. Corrie Sanders
Famous for shocking the world and demolishing then-WBO heavyweight champion Wladimir Klitschko, South African Sanders was later shot and killed during an armed robbery in 2012. He was 46.
10. Julian Letterlough
Letterlough, an exciting light-heavyweight slugger known as ‘Mr KO’, had his life cut short in 2005 at the age of 35. He was shot in the back while leaving a bar with his wife in Reading, Pennsylvania.
