SANTA PAULA : Judge Orders Boxer to Pay $180,000

Former boxing champion Lupe Aquino of Santa Paula has been ordered to pay $180,000 to the son of a man killed in a 1988 automobile accident for which Aquino was convicted of drunken driving.

The ruling was handed down in Ventura County Superior Court by Judge Burt Henson, a retired Municipal Court judge hearing the case on assignment.

The wrongful death suit was filed on behalf of Cameron Thomas, 10, whose father, Howard Thomas of Ventura, was one of two passengers killed in the 1988 accident in Van Nuys, said Mark Borrell, the boy’s attorney.

Also killed in the crash was Teresa M. Bello, who was riding in the back seat of Aquino’s car when it veered off the San Diego Freeway in Van Nuys and rolled down an embankment. A third passenger, Michelle Avila, was injured in the crash.

Aquino, a former World Boxing Council super welter-weight boxing champion, pleaded no contest in 1989 to a charge of felony drunken driving and served three years of a six-year sentence before being released last November.

The judgment was the fourth against Aquino since the fatal accident. Aquino was ordered to pay $1 million to Maya Thomas, Cameron’s half-sister, $158,000 to Bello’s daughter, and more than $150,000 to Avila in separate civil actions, said Terry K. Martin, Aquino’s attorney.

Aquino, 31, has trained to compete in boxing since his release last year, but the most recent court judgment has clouded his chances for a title fight, Martin said.

Aquino has said one of the passengers contributed to the accident by wrenching the steering wheel away from him, and he has sued Allstate Insurance to pay for the claims against him, Martin said.

“Lupe wants to do something for the kids,” Martin said. “He has never been anything but remorseful.”