PFL lightweight champion Usman Nurmagomedov has been sentenced to six months in prison in Abu Dhabi for his role in Wednesday’s hotel brawl with former UFC bantamweight champion Merab Dvalishvili. The official X account of the Abu Dhabi Judicial Department confirmed the conviction Friday morning, two days after the incident.
The headcount depends on who you read. Bloody Elbow, citing the Judicial Department, reported that Nurmagomedov was one of 10 defendants convicted. MMA Fighting and other outlets reported eight people, Nurmagomedov plus seven others. According to The National, as relayed by MMA Mania, six men who attacked Dvalishvili and his friend Saba Lazishvili were convicted of disturbing public security, causing panic and endangering lives. Two more men, the ones who filmed the brawl, received the same sentence for violating privacy by using information technology to film and publish the footage, per a post from the Championship Rounds account citing the Judicial Department.
The penalties went beyond the cell time. Each of those convicted was fined Dh300,000 (roughly $82,000), and all of them will be deported from the UAE once they finish serving.
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Dvalishvili didn’t escape the courtroom clean either. He and Lazishvili were each fined Dh50,000 (about $14,000) for disturbing public security and assaulting others, according to the Judicial Department. Both were released from jail Friday morning.
The footage that started all this showed Dvalishvili getting jumped from behind by a group of men, Nurmagomedov among them, which Bloody Elbow described as a vicious attack. That video ended up doing a lot of the prosecution’s work. ESPN’s Jed Meshew put it bluntly on X: “Turns out that filming yourself doing crimes isn’t a smart idea. Weird.”
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Nurmagomedov’s manager, Ali Abdelaziz, apologized for the incident in comments captured by MMA Junkie’s Mike Bohn. “What happened was something unacceptable,” Abdelaziz said, adding that he didn’t think any words could make it better.
What it means for the PFL belt
Nurmagomedov’s last appearance came against Archie Colgan at PFL New York on July 31 at UBS Arena in Belmont Park, New York. Now the promotion’s lightweight champion is looking at half a year behind bars in a foreign country, followed by deportation. The sources don’t say whether he plans to appeal, and MMA Mania openly questioned whether he’ll actually serve the full term.
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My take: six months for jumping a man from behind sounds about right to me, and I’m surprised it took an Abu Dhabi court to finally hand out a real consequence. For years these hotel lobby and cageside scuffles have ended with a viral clip and a shrug. Here, the shrug cost 300,000 dirhams a head and a one-way ticket out of the country. If the PFL has a lightweight title fight on its 2027 calendar, it should start planning around a champion who may be unavailable until May at the earliest.
