Masa Saito Was A Great Wrestler And Half Of Pro Wrestling's Most Famous Arrest

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In the earliest hours of April 6, 1984, on the way back from an April 5 show nearby, Saito and fellow AWA villain Ken Patera tried to get a post-show meal at a McDonald’s in Waukesha, Wisconsin. They were refused service because it had closed. This is where the official story diverges from what the wrestlers would claim in contemporaneous reportsfrom the next few days.

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Witnesses said that Patera, a former Olympic lifter and “World’s Strongest Man” competitor, threw a rock “the size of a bowling ball”—or possibly bigger, as another article cited the police in calling it a “33 pound boulder”—through the McDonald’s window. The wrestlers then went to their motel and the police soon followed, where they asked if a large man checked in. Two had, as it happened, and the police were directed to the wrestlers’ room. Minutes later, one of their supervisors responded to the motel, where he found one of the officers, Jacquelyn Hibbard, unconscious on the floor, and two others battling with the wrestlers. It took “about a dozen” cops in total to actually arrest Saito and Patera; they were booked on charges of battery to a police officer, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, obstructing an officer, and criminal damage to property.

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Saito and Patera were found guilty within hours; their trial lawyer (it’s not clear which one) was found to be in contempt of court because he and his clients skipped the verdict to go drink beer somewhere nearby. Days later, they were each sentenced to two years in prison; the judge reportedly told them that they would each be eligible for parole in six months and guaranteed it in 18.

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