SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - Former
championship boxer Hector "Macho" Camacho died Saturday at the hospital
in Puerto Rico where he has been unconscious since he was shot in the
face in an attack in his hometown.
Camacho went into cardiac
arrest in the pre-dawn hours and he was then taken off life support and
died shortly thereafter, said Dr. Ernesto Torres, the director of the
Centro Medico trauma center in San Juan.
Camacho's mother, Maria
Matias, said Friday night that she had supported removing him from life
support after his three sons had arrived from the U.S. mainland and had a
chance to see their father for the last time. They managed to visit him
before he died, said former pro boxer Victor "Luvi" Callejas, a
longtime friend.
"The family is destroyed," Callejas said outside the hospital.
Doctors had declared
Camacho brain dead on Thursday. Matias had said she decided it was time
for doctors to disconnect life support over the objections of the
boxer's eldest son, Hector Jr., because there was no chance of recovery.
"I lost my son three days
ago. He's alive only because of a machine," she said Friday night. "My
son is not alive. My son is only alive for the people who love him," she
added.
Torres said that none of
the boxer's organs could be donated because of the time between when he
was declared brain dead and his death after going into cardiac arrest
for the second time since the shooting.
Callejas lamented the
inability to donate the organs. "It's unfortunate that five more lives
could not have been saved," he said. "This could have been avoided."
Camacho was shot as he sat
in a car with a friend, 49-year-old Adrian Mojica Moreno, who was killed
in the attack. Police spokesman Alex Diaz said officers found nine
small bags of cocaine in the friend's pocket and a 10th bag open inside
the car.
Police reported no arrests
and said investigators continued to look for potential witnesses. Capt.
Rafael Rosa told reporters they were following several leads, but
declined to say whether police had identified any suspects. He said very
few witnesses were cooperating.
Hector Camacho Jr. decried
the violence that grips Puerto Rico, a U.S. island territory of nearly 4
million people that reported a record 1,117 homicides last year.
"Death, jail, drugs, killings," he said. "That's what the streets are now."
Camacho's sisters have said
they would like to fly Camacho's body to New York and bury him there.
Camacho grew up mostly in Harlem, earning the nickname the "Harlem
Heckler."
He won super lightweight,
lightweight and junior welterweight world titles in the 1980s and fought
high-profile bouts against Felix Trinidad, Julio Cesar Chavez and Sugar
Ray Leonard while compiling a career record of 79-6-3. He knocked out
Leonard in 1997, ending the former champ's final comeback attempt.
Camacho battled drug,
alcohol and other problems throughout his life. He was sentenced in 2007
to seven years in prison on burglary charges, but a judge eventually
suspended all but one year of the sentence and gave Camacho probation.
He wound up serving two weeks in jail after violating that probation. A
wife also filed domestic abuse complaints against him twice before their
divorce.
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