By Michael Marley
If she didn't know it before, female boxer Melissa St. Vil knows it now.
Defendants with the last name Mayweather can get special treatment when it comes to felony criminal charges for beating up women in the Las Vegas courts.
St. Vil is still reeling from the surprising news that Roger Mayweather, uncle-trainer of undefeated Floyd Jr. and a two-time world champion himself, got a no jail "free pass" from prosecutors and a judge on Jan. 21.
In court, a district attorney told the judge St. Vil, who was 26-years-old when she was attacked by Mayweather on Aug. 2, 2009, agreed to a plea deal package.
Despite a lengthy past record which includes assaults on women, Uncle Roger was allowed to cop out with a plea that gave him community service but not a single day in prison. He has to pay a measly $1,000 fine, do 50 hours of community service, stay on probation for one year and attend 50 hours of domestic violence counseling.
Saying the victim "agreed" in court means what, by the way?
The truth is the badly battered St. Vil had little say in the conclusion to the case and is about to file a civil lawsuit against Mayweather for money damages.
"It left me hurting how the case ended," St. Vil told me in an exclusive interview.
"I'm still hurting, mentally and physically from that incident. But they made their decision. It still doesn't make it OK, or make it OK to assault a woman. That's not OK even in Las Vegas when your last name is Mayweather.
"The ending was another slap in the face to me, to all women really. Or maybe I should say, despite all the evidence including police officers seeing Roger choking and strangling me when they arrived, all he got for it was a slap on the wrist.
"Yes," said St. Vil, "I am filing a lawsuit. My lawyer is working on it now. Roger was on HBO's 24/7, on national television, and he lied to them, saying I started the whole thing. I was in total shock when he came at me and put his hands around my neck."
Roger--known as the "Black Mamba" in his boxing days--has said that St. Vil used force on him, bashing him with a lamp, and that he was trying only to defend himselfSt. Vil was briefly trained in a Vegas gym and was in an apartment--what Roger referred to in a recent interview on Examiner.com as his "condiment"--when the ex-fighter angrily confronted her and said she had to leave the premises.
The 27 year old St. Vil, a New Yorker whose ring nickname is "Guard Your Grill," tried to protect herself when, she said, Mayweather jumped her because she was in the apartment where boxer Cornelius Lock had given her permission to stay. At the time, I believe Mayweather trained Lock.
Despite being put in a strangle hold, St. Vil said she was able to use her mobile phone to call 911 and request police assistance.
St. Vil has some thoughts about Nephew Floyd's pending "Baby Mama Drama" case and I'll get to those in my next story.
Unbeaten Floyd, who along with Manny Pacquiao can bring a big financial special event jackpot into the hurting casino economy, is back before a judge on those felony counts on March 10.
Let's see if "Money" also enjoys the Mayweather "home court advantage."
