Fact check: Darren Till was not arrested in Las Vegas ahead of his UFC Fight Night bout with Derek Brunson
On the day of his much-awaited return to the octagon against Derek Brunson, news of Darren Till's arrest surfaced on the internet. However, the news is untrue.
Darren Till was not arrested by Las Vegas authorities ahead of the Fight Night event. He is all set to face Derek Brunson in their middleweight clash for a possible future title shot.
The rumor was started as a prank by a website named MMAFPress that specializes in fake news on mixed martial arts:
"MMAFPress is here to provide the premiere fake press that you can trust from the sport of UFC, everything written on this website is purely for entertainment purposes and we do not consider ourselves to be reporting factual news," says the description on the website.
MMAFPress also provided a doctored image of Darren Till inside a Las Vegas police vehicle along with the article. You can read the fake article here. The website has published many comedic fake MMA news articles, such as Dustin Poirier making a cameo appearance in a 6ix9ine music video and Jon Jones testing positive for PEDs again.
Darren Till was arrested for stealing a cab in Tenerife, Spain
Even though the latest rumor about Darren Till's arrest is fake, 'The Gorilla' was actually arrested once while vacationing in the Canary Islands of Spain in April 2019.
Darren Till, along with four other tourists, were arrested in the Costa Adeje area Tenerife of Canary Islands, Spain. The arrest was due to alleged destruction of a hotel and stealing a taxi. Tenerife local daily El Dia was the first to report on the matter and the Daily Mail followed it up.
The report stated that Darren Till and his companions were staying at a lodging complex where they broke furniture and emptied fire extinguishers. After getting expelled from the property, they went to another hotel in the upper El Duque area, where they were turned away as well.
While leaving the second hotel in a Volkswagen Caddy taxi, Darren Till reportedly drove away with the vehicle while the driver loaded their luggage in the boot. He drove to the area of La Caleta. The entourage was intercepted by the local police soon afterwards.
In an interview with Fighters Only a couple of months later, Darren Till opened up on the matter. He said that the news got blown way out of proportion because of his popularity. Till detailed what happened that night and denied the claim that the hotel they were staying in got trashed:
"Then we were in the hotel, and there were these other guys in the room. And we werenβt having trouble, but just a little bother broke out β not fights and whatnot. Obviously, the hotel didnβt get trashed. There was no criminal damage. But things got thrown and whatever," Darren Till said.
He also denied being involved in the theft of the taxi, but admitted that such an incident did take place.
Watch the full video below: