Michael Spinks a superstar, at least in the boxing world. He began appearing on the covers of boxing magazines and boxing fans started clamoring for a unification fight with WBC champion Dwight Muhammad Qawi. Tragedy struck his life, however, when in January 1983, his 24-year-old wife, Sandy Massey, died in a car crash, leaving Spinks the single parent of his two-year-old daughter, Michelle. Meanwhile, the fight all the fans wanted was being asked for by boxing critics and magazine editors, too. On March 18, two months after his wife's death, Spinks and Qawi met in a boxing ring for the undisputed light
Michael Spinks and used Spinks's money to pay his and his children's own personal and business expenses. Also name as a defendant was Robert L. Johnson, founder of Black Entertainment Television, head of the real estate firm of RLJ Development LLC, in Bethesda, Maryland, and one of the executors of Lewis's $8.5 million estate. According to Spinks's lawyers, following Lewis's death Johnson and attorney Leonard Williams stopped the payments without telling him, which in turn caused Spinks' health insurance to lapse and bills totaling up to $50,000 a month to go unpaid. "Spinks had to invade his pension and retirement funds and