Tanzman Named in Drug Report Forgery Case
By Katherine Dunn
June 3, 2000

The Multnomah County District Attorney's office has been handed the results of the police investigation into a fake drug report that allowed boxer Awel Abdulai to fight on a Feb. 19 show in Portland, Oregon. The allegations will be reviewed by the D.A. before a decision is made to seek an indictment. The police report names Portland fight booking agent Howard "Howie" Tanzman. As reported previously by the CBZ, several witnesses finger Tanzman as the cut-and-paste artist who created a false negative drug report after Abdulai's actual test came back positive. Tanzman has a checkered reputation, including an accusation by heavyweight Marcus Rhode of Oklahoma that Tanzman tricked him out of most of Rhode's purse for a match that Tanzman had arranged in Japan.

The falsified report was accepted by the Oregon Commission and welterweight Abdulai, of Las Vegas, competed in the event at the Roseland Theater in Portland, losing a 6 round decision to Mahon Washington.

A reporter from Willamette Week Newspaper, Mac Montandon, discovered the faked test two weeks after the show took place. In the wake of the publicity, a formal complaint was filed with the Governor, the attorney general, and the Oregon State Police, alleging a pattern of ineffective and slipshod enforcement by the Oregon Commission. A separate investigation into those allegations is still ongoing.