Tyson Fury recalls harrowing moment he took call to say his cousin had been stabbed to death

Tyson Fury has recalled the devastating moment he was told his cousin had been killed.

Last year, Rico Burton was stabbed outside a club in Altrincham, Greater Manchester.

Sadly, the 31-year-old died as a result of his injuries, which were inflicted on him by Liam O'Pray, 22.

In the recent tell-all documentary series At Home With The Furys, aired on Netflix, the heavyweight champion opens up his home to the cameras.

On the night of Rico's death, Tyson and his wife, Paris, were out in Majorca watching Anthony Joshua's heavyweight bout with Oleksandr Usyk.

The following morning, Tyson woke to a phone call informing him that his cousin had died.

"Last night I was on a high after the Usyk fight,” he says in the doc. “We had a great party, me and Paris were dancing. It was a great night.

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“Then this morning I got a phone call telling me my cousin Rico has been killed. It’s like someone took the plug out of me and all the life had come out of me.

"Rico had a whole lot of life to live and now he’s finished, shocking news."

Recalling their childhood together, the dad-of-five said: “Me and Rico are really close. We trained at the same boxing club together.

"We used to play up and down when we were small kids, hide and seek, building dens. Precious moments.”

The news sent Tyson, who has struggled with his mental health over the years, into a dark hole.

And Paris said she feared the worst when she saw a change in him after being told about his cousin's murder.

“Tyson got the call early in the morning,” she said. “He went into a really low, quiet mood which isn’t good for Tyson.

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"Such a devastating phone call can change everything that’s going on in his life and I think Tyson found it really hard to process that it happened.”

Following a trial at Manchester Crown Court, O'Pray, who denied stabbing Rico, was convicted of murder.

It was heard that he had used a lockknife to stab Rico in the neck during a fight outside a bar.

The knife’s seven-inch blade cut open the major carotid artery in Rico’s neck, causing massive blood loss.

At a hearing last week, O'Pray was handed the mandatory life sentence for murder, and ordered to serve a minimum of 28 years before parole.

Topics: UK News, Tyson Fury, Crime, Netflix, TV and Film

Dominic Smithers

Dominic Smithers is LADbible's Editorial Lead. After graduating from the University of Leeds with a degree in French and History, he went on to write for the Manchester Evening News, the Accrington Observer and the Macclesfield Express. So as you can imagine, he’s spent many a night wondering just how useful that second language has been. But c'est la vie.

@SmithersDom