To describe him as dazzling would be an understatement. Viewed soberly, René Weller was a talented boxer who helped his sport gain increasing attention in Germany in the 1980s. Even more than with his fights, however, he dominated the headlines at the time with the spectacle he created around them, but later also repeatedly with his criminal machinations. Weller has now passed away at the age of 69 as a result of his dementia. This was confirmed by his wife Maria Picture-Newspaper late Tuesday evening.
The disease was diagnosed in 2014, recently René Weller was getting worse and worse, he was cared for by palliative care physicians. “I let him go, it was very difficult in the last few weeks,” said Maria Weller, who also reported on her husband’s last days and hours on Instagram. “He was screaming, he was in pain,” she wrote. Weller’s approaching death had become apparent in the past few days, and his wife asked his friends to say goodbye to him.
“You fought like a lion, but unfortunately lost your last fight,” said Maria Weller’s Instagram post. “I thank you for the beautiful life and our unique great love.”
Weller’s sporting career was quite remarkable. In 1983, he won the super featherweight championship of the insignificant World Athletic Association by beating American James Ortega in the first round with a knockout. A year later he also became European champion. He only lost the belt in his fifth title defense against eventual WBO champion Gert Bo Jacobsen. That was the only loss of his professional career. By the time he turned pro, the 1976 Olympic competitor had fought a total of 355 amateur bouts, winning 338 of them.
“Others would have to have three lives to experience what I experienced”
But Weller also became famous for his extravagant appearances and outfits – in the 80s he was a kind of cult figure and a gifted entertainer. He acted like a playboy and was often called “the beautiful René” in the media. The trained goldsmith and heating engineer wore a golden boxing glove on a gold chain around his neck, he posed in a royal cloak or surrounded by three beauties in a swimming pool. “I’m the only German who looks better naked than dressed,” he said.
Weller also posed alone in the swimming pool – including golden boxing gloves.
(Photo: imago/Sven Simon)
A recording from 1983.
(Photo: Jörg Schmitt/dpa)
Weller left out almost nothing in his life. Women, parties, showbiz, prison. In the past 20 years, appearances as a C-celebrity in the Big Brother house, at the “Perfect Dinner” or at the “Celebrity Wife Swap”. The fact that the Pforzheimer was once the best German lightweight boxer and European champion, that he only lost one of his 55 fights as a professional, was increasingly forgotten.
“Others would have to have three lives to experience what I experienced,” Weller once told the sports information service. He kept doing things that others thought were crazy. Before his fight against Charles LaCour in Las Vegas at the end of June 1982, he had previously staked his entire fee of $25,000 on his win, he told the Mirror. Of course he won the fight.
Part of Weller’s eventful life was that he had several run-ins with the law during and after his career. He was sentenced to imprisonment in 1999 for cocaine trafficking, incitement to forge documents and illegal possession of weapons. He spent four and a half years in prison. Weller always claimed he had been tricked: he had never had anything to do with drugs. After his release, Weller tried his hand at being an actor, musician, boxing trainer and initiator of an entertainment show.
The Wellers have already planned everything for the funeral service. According to Maria Weller, six former boxers are to carry the coffin into the chapel, while the song “Time to say goodbye” by Andrea Bocelli is to be played. The inside of the coffin is lined with Harley-Davidson bed linen, while the outside is decorated with a red rose, Weller’s original boxing gloves and a German flag.