Boxing referee who officiated in the notorious ‘ear-bite’ fight
MILLS LANE, who has died aged 85, was an international boxing referee who during the 1980s and 1990s became a familiar face to fans; renowned for his gruff demeanour and pre-fight catchphrase “Let’s get it on!”, the shaven-headed Lane presided over more than 100 world championship bouts in a career lasting more than 20 years.
Yet Lane will be best remembered for being “the third man” on that infamous occasion in Las Vegas on June 28 1997 when he was forced to disqualify Mike Tyson for tearing off a chunk of Evander Holyfield’s right ear and spitting it out on to the canvas.
Tyson proceeded to leave Holyfield grimacing in pain by biting his left ear, giving Lane – who had seemingly been unaware of the extent of the original infringement – no option but to wave the fight off in round three.
“How many times do you want to get bit?” Lane enquired of a ringside reporter wanting to know why the fight was stopped. “There’s a goddamn limit to anything, you know – including bites.”
Lane had also been the man in the middle at Vegas in November 1986 when the-then 20-year-old Tyson had sent the Jamaican fighter Trevor Berbick staggering around the ring following a monstrous uppercut to seize the World Boxing Council heavyweight crown.
Lane, himself a former fighter, prophetically observed: “Everything Tyson’s got has ‘goodnight’ written all over it.”
But it was Lane’s strict moral code and intolerance for misbehaviour that made him greatly respected. “Everything is discipline,” he told one interviewer. “When I’m working a fight I give the same energy and attention to a four-rounder as I do a million-dollar fight.”
For many, in a sport frequently beset by chaos and skullduggery, Lane represented law and order.
Born on November 12 1937 in Savannah, Georgia, Mills Bee Lane III took up boxing on joining the Marines in 1956. When based at Okinawa he was crowned All Far East welterweight champion, later going on to have a brief, but successful, professional career.
He began refereeing fights while a student at University of Nevada. Having subsequently picked up a law degree from the University of Utah he embarked on a legal career that saw him start out as a trial prosecutor in Reno and, later, a judge.
In 1991, Lane told the Los Angeles Times that the most memorable fight he refereed was the featherweight title match between Salvador Sánchez and Danny Lopez in 1980. “Sánchez gave him a beating and stopped him in the 14th round,” he recalled, “but it’ll be a long time before I forget Danny Lopez’s courage that night.”
In November 1993 Lane’s reputation for imperturbability was sorely tested when the Riddick Bowe-evander Holyfield heavyweight rematch in Las Vegas was temporarily suspended when a crazed fan paraglided into the ring. In August 1995, he was centre stage when Tyson outclassed Peter Mcneeley – following the latter’s suicidal charge across the ring – in his comeback fight following a three-year prison stretch.
Then in February 1997, just four months before the Tyson v Holyfield “Bite of the Century” encounter, he was again in charge when the American Oliver Mccall suffered a breakdown during his rematch with Lennox Lewis and had to be led by Lane back to his corner sobbing uncontrollably in round five.
Lane was possibly relieved to bring his refereeing days to an end at Thomas Hearns’s win over Jay Snyder at Detroit in November 1998.
After boxing, Lane briefly had his own television show and also appeared on MTV’S Celebrity Deathmatch. a stroke in 2002 left him paralysed on one side and unable to speak. In 2013 he was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame.
Mills Lane is survived by his wife Kay and their two sons.
Mills Lane, born November 12 1937, died December 6 2022