Joe Son

Joseph Hyungmin Son (; born November 20, 1970) He attended Cypress High School in Cypress, California with Scott Aukerman, where he was on the high school wrestling team.

Mixed martial arts career Son was a mixed martial arts fighter and retired with a record of 0–4. Although Son placed Hackney in a chokehold, his opponent escaped and punched Son repeatedly in the groin,

After his fight in UFC, Son competed in a match for the K-1 Kickboxing federation, facing established star Nobuaki Kakuda. The much heavier Son initially led the pace with body shots and knees, scoring a mild knockdown by right hook, but he was eventually knocked out by Kakuda via high kick and punches.

In 2002, Son debuted for Japanese promotion PRIDE Fighting Championships, fighting Takada Dojo exponent Yusuke Imamura at the PRIDE The Best Vol.2. He infamously wore a leopard thong with the PRIDE logo and sported eye makeup, as well as a bowler hat at his entrance, and hugged Imamura during the staredown. The bout was short, and Son quit after he was taken down and almost slid out of the ring, claiming an elbow injury.

On April 12, 2002, Son also took part in Xtreme Pankration 2, wherein he faced Joe Moreira. After a brief exchange of strikes, Moreira landed a hit which drew blood, and Son then refused to continue fighting, and the fight was called. The result was officially listed as "submission (terror)". Son would return to PRIDE in July, facing Jukei Nakajima, and he once again gave up after being injured by being thrown on his head by the Japanese fighter.

Son was also a professional wrestler in Japan for a short time, wrestling Shinya Hashimoto at All Japan Pro Wrestling's second Wrestle-1 event and working as singer and dancer for HUSTLE's third event.

Fighting Style Son entered the UFC billed as a Taekwondo 3rd Dan Black Belt, practitioner of Judo, and founder of his fictional fighting style called "Josondo."

During his bout against Keith Hackney at UFC 4, Son wore standard wrestling shoes and heavily utilized American folkstyle wrestling techniques, including an opening clinch takedown and a front headlock hold on the ground, despite being formally billed to the audience as a founder of "Josondo" and a representative of Taekwondo and Judo. It was common among some wrestlers participating in early UFC, including Tank Abbott, to be billed as stylists of other martial arts instead for promotional purposes.

However, in one of Kimo Leopoldo's interview, his friend, Leopoldo, only referred to Son generally as a "street fighter" with natural power and athleticism, leaving his formal martial arts training completely unmentioned.

Acting career Apart from his criminal convictions, Son is known for his role in the 1997 movie Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery as Random Task, a parody of the James Bond character Oddjob. This was also his final film role. Previously, Son had appeared in several low-budget action films, including Joshua Tree (1993) and Bloodfist V: Human Target (1994). He played the main villain in the Lorenzo Lamas action film Bad Blood in 1994. He plays a supporting role in Shootfighter: Fight to the Death (1993) and a leading role as the main villain in its sequel Shootfighter II (1996).

Torture and manslaughter convictions Joe Son was first arrested for kicking in the door of a roommate's car. He pleaded guilty to felony vandalism on May 16, 2008, whereupon he was sentenced to probation and 60 days in jail. As a condition of his plea agreement, Son was required to provide a DNA sample. On August 18, 2008, he was taken into custody and given an additional 90 days in jail for failing to report to the Department of Probation and keep them informed of his current residence. In early October 2008, his DNA sample was matched to a sexual assault cold case that occurred on Christmas Eve, 1990. Already in custody for a probation violation, Son was arrested at the Theo Lacy facility on October 7, 2008.

On December 24, 1990, the anonymous victim was walking back to her apartment alone with her dog. Son distracted her by asking for directions and pretending he was lost. Son, and accomplice Santiago Gaitan, a friend from high school, then forcibly dragged her to their car, and threatened to kill her. Son and Gaitan repeatedly raped, sodomized, tortured, and pistol whipped the woman. Eventually, after pushing her out of the car naked and carrying out a mock execution, Son released her. Investigators collected DNA from the woman and created composite sketches, but there was not a large enough DNA databank in 1990 to make a connection, and the sketches went unrecognized. However, before jury selection could begin for his trial in August 2011, the charges against Son were dropped having expired due to the statute of limitations on sexual assault and kidnapping. Son was instead charged with conspiracy to commit murder and torture, crimes with no statute of limitations.

Gaitan, 40, confessed and pled guilty to one felony count each of kidnapping, "sodomy by force in concert", "rape in concert", "forcible oral copulation", and "forcible rape with a sentencing enhancement for committing rape while armed with a firearm". He was sentenced January 28, 2011, to 17 years and four months in state prison, with parole possible in 2018. Son touted his acting career, but denied the crime or any contact with the victim, which he maintained to his trial. During the trial, the Orange County District Attorney's Office maintained that Son and his co-defendant pistol-whipped, tortured and repeatedly sexually assaulted their female victim before releasing her with her pants tied around her eyes. During the trial, the woman said that Son told her: "It's Christmas. This is your lucky day."

Son was found guilty of one felony count of torture, and given a life sentence. The beating happened on October 10, 2011, at 5:25 pm, on "B" Yard Reception, building 5 at Wasco State Prison. The man died 25 minutes later from multiple blunt force trauma. The victim was someone who had lived as a transient, and was serving two years for failure to register as a sex offender. After the killing, Son was moved to solitary confinement. On September 13, 2013, Son was charged with Graham's murder. At his trial in 2017, he was found guilty of voluntary manslaughter, and received an additional 27-year sentence.

Mixed martial arts record Loss

Jukei Nakajima TKO (shoulder injury) Pride The Best Vol.2

Tokyo, Japan Loss

Joe Moreira Submission (terror) Xtreme Pankration 2

Los Angeles, California, United States Loss

Yusuke Imamura TKO (elbow injury) Pride The Best Vol.1

Tokyo, Japan Loss

Keith Hackney Submission (groin strikes) UFC 4

Tulsa, Oklahoma, United States Kickboxing record ResultRecordOpponentMethodEventDateRoundTimeLocationNotesLoss0–1 Nobuaki KakudaKO (Punch)K-3 Grand Prix '9511:40 Nagoya, Japan