Police are investigating after a Conservative Club in the northeast of England hosted a wrestling "death match" in which two men beat each other with glass and a garden strimmer in front of a shocked audience that included children.
Blizzard and Ronnie Thatcher went head-to-head at the New Seaham Conservative Club in County Durham last month, in an event that was allegedly advertised to families at discounted rates. The nature of the extreme fight was not disclosed on at least one poster for the show.
Colliery Championship Wrestling (CCW) apologised for the event and said future fights would be advertised for “mature audiences” only.
A spokeswoman for Durham Constabulary said: "We are working with Durham County Council's licensing team after a number of complaints were received by the local authority in relation to an event at Seaham Conservative Club on April 29. Enquiries are ongoing."
So-called death matches became popular throughout the 1990s as a style of hardcore wrestling in which participants use objects and weapons, including using barbed wire for ring ropes.
The event at the New Seaham Conservative Club was highlighted by local wrestler “Benji” who said he had “never seen this type of ultra-violence in front of a family audience”.
He added: “The videos I've seen there was a mother shielding their child's face as glass and blood went everywhere.”
A spokesperson for the wrestling company said: "CCW understand the concerns people may have had over this event, and to anyone who attended we apologise if this has affected your experience negatively in any way.
"We would like to assure those with an interest that all appropriate safety measures were in place and first aiders were on hand, as they have been since day one.
"Both participants were checked out and looked after following the event.
"We are growing and learning as a live event company and have overall had positive feedback from live audiences around the east Durham area at our last seven successful events including this one.
"We are aware that a portion of our audience may have missed the weeks of online content building to the match, in which various aspects of the match were mentioned, and that some may have exercised their freedom and judgement to allow family members to remain in the room after the championship match to watch this take place under their guidance and supervision.
"We feel that continuing to discuss one half hour segment detracts from the hard work and effort that the other performers on the night put in for the entertainment of the patrons of CCW, however we are aware that there are people that enjoyed this as part of the overall show.
"Moving forward we will take great care in ensuring that any similar events that may take place do so on shows advertised as 'for mature audiences' only.
"On May 27, CCW will return with a family orientated show, and our ticket allocation is already sold out."
Seaham Conservative Club secretary, Linda Willis, told ChronicleLive that CCW hired the room from them and that there had not been problems in the past.
“The feedback that we’ve had from our members is that it was a fantastic night,” she was quoted as saying. “We had people coming in from the bar saying ‘that’s fantastic, tell us when the next one is, I want to bring my grandchildren along’.”
The Independent contacted New Seaham Conservative Club for comment.
