For decades, the 1988 Olympic final between Roy Jones Jr. and Park Si Hun has stood as boxing’s most infamous robbery. In May 2023, the story finally came full circle. Park traveled from South Korea to Jones’ ranch in Pensacola, walked into his gym, and placed the gold medal in Jones’ hands.
It wasn’t staged, and it wasn’t sanitized. Park arrived with his family, 35 years after the decision that scarred them both. The man who left Seoul as a “winner” came to hand over the medal and acknowledge what the world already knew: it never belonged to him.
Roy Jones Jr. Receives 1988 Olympic Gold Medal
The Robbery That Changed Olympic Boxing
Jones dominated Park in Seoul. He outlanded him by a reported 86 punches to 32, won the Val Barker Trophy as the tournament’s most outstanding boxer, and still the judges gave Park the gold, 3–2. The outrage was global. The IOC launched an inquiry, multiple referees and judges were suspended, and Olympic scoring reforms followed.
Jones left Korea robbed but not broken. He vowed never to let judges decide his career again. Over the next decade, he became one of the sport’s pound-for-pound kings — moving from junior middleweight to heavyweight champion, a leap no one had done in over a century.
Park’s Burden After Seoul
Park’s life didn’t unfold like that of a champion. He reportedly apologized to Jones immediately after the decision, but at home he was vilified. Branded a thief, he battled depression, made suicide attempts, and carried the weight of that night for decades.
In a three-hour interview following the medal return — documented by KBS in South Korea — Park admitted the toll nearly destroyed him. His visit to Pensacola was less a gesture than a release. Through his son, he told Jones:
“I had the gold medal, but I wanted to give it back to you. It belongs to you.”
Then, with a half-smile, he added: “This gold medal is your problem now.”
A New Chapter for Jones
For Jones, it was a shock. “I thought I was coming in for an interview,” he told Sky Sports. “Then I see Park standing there with the medal.”
The handover has opened a new chapter. After years of dodging questions about Seoul, Jones is now considering a documentary — not just about the medal, but about his entire journey: the robbery, the resilience, the rise to greatness.
What happened in 1988 can’t be erased. But on May 30, 2023, inside a quiet Pensacola gym, boxing’s longest-running controversy finally had an ending — one written not by judges, but by the fighters themselves.
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