6 WWE Stars Who Got In SERIOUS Trouble With The Law
4. Rob Van Dam & Sabu / Jim Duggan & Iron Sheik
Jim Cornette once opined that a seven year gap was a long enough one to leave if wrestling wanted to plagiarise itself. Literary experts suggest there are only ever seven basic plots, and considering how much wrestling as a genre struggles with the very act of basic plotting, it stands to reason why promoters, bookers and even creative writers might copy their own homework from time to time.
Does that wave away Rob Van Dam and Sabu's 2006 transgression more than WWE did at the time? 'The Prince Of Polyester' probably wasn't considering how his rule might apply to real life when he came up with it, but considering how much the entire industry had changed in the 10 years since Jim Duggan and The Iron Sheik were copped for almost the exact same thing, maybe 'Mr Monday Night' and the late 'Suicidal, Homicidal, Genocidal' star were right to assume the problem could just go away?
To reset; on July 1st 2006, then-WWE Champion Rob Van Dam and longstanding ally Sabu were pulled over for speeding in Hanging Rock, Ohio during travel between shows. Per Van Dam's recollections, the officers recognised the duo and this might have been the end of story had this actually been the end of story. Unfortunately for the ECW icons, police searched the vehicle during the stop and found marijuana and painkillers in Van Dam's possession. They also found Sabu in possession of drug paraphernalia and unidentified pills. They were arrested, required to post a bond, and WWE even went public with the story (and the company response to it) when it got out via other media outlets.
Context is everything, and a combination of WWE trying (and failing) to prove that its nascent wellness initiative was working and Van Dam being company figurehead resulted in harsh and swift consequences. RVD lost his WWE and ECW Championships over a 48 hour period that also signalled the end of any main event run he'd ever get for the market leader. Sabu didn't have much status to lose, continuing to look at the lights for the likes of The Big Show and Bob Holly on WWE's warped version of the Philadelphia brand before he was released as part of some company-wide releases the following May.
Similar punishments for similar were doled out a decade earlier when Duggan and Sheik were found to have marijuana and cocaine on them during a routine traffic stop in 1987. They earned a DUI, but this was troublingly nothing new for wrestlers at the time. What really got them knee deep in release papers was the fact that officers caught them together. Kayfabe was allegedly still enough of an uncrossable line then that one discretion was deemed much bigger than the other and both were let go - Duggan for less than four months but Sheik for just shy of four years.