ECW was famous for their hardcore style wrestling employing excessive usage of blading. By far the most controversial incident relating to blading was the Mass Transit incident at ECW on November 23, 1996. During a scheduled tag team match between the team of Axl Rotten and D-Von Dudley vs. the team of New Jack and Mustafa Saed, Axle Rotten could not make the show and was replaced by a 17-year-old fan Erich Kulas who lied about his age, claiming to be 21. Before the match, Kulas asked New Jack (who was notoriously mentally aggressive) to blade him since he never had done it himself, and New Jack agreed. New Jack bladed Kulas with a surgical scalpel but cut too deeply and severed two arteries in Kulas' forehead. Kulas screamed in pain, then passed out as blood poured from his head, and was later hospitalized. The incident generated much negative publicity and a lawsuit by Kulas's family, where New Jack was charged but the Jury dropped all charges as the blading was done per Kulas's request and Kulas had lied about his age. Erich Kulas later died on May 12, 2002, but no connection was made between his death and the incident.