Daniel Cormier believes his longtime friend and teammate Cain Velasquez is at peace with whatever outcome surfaces from his attempted murder trial in California.
Velasquez will appear in Santa Clara County District Court on October 18th for sentencing on attempted murder and other charges stemming from a 2022 incident. He allegedly attempted to shoot and kill Harry Goularte, who is accused of molesting Velasquez’s son.
Velasquez faces a potential jail sentence for attempted murder and weapons-related charges. He posted bail in October 2022 after an eight-month incarceration but remains under house arrest.
Velasquez pleaded no-contest to the charges, effectively avoiding a life sentence. Cormier, who speaks often with the former UFC heavyweight champion, revealed how Velasquez is handling the stress of his case.
Daniel Cormier: Cain Velasquez ready to accept the consequences
In a recent episode of the Pound 4 Pound podcast, Cormier weighed in on the final weeks of Velasquez’s attempted murder trial.
“Now, he’s ready to stand up and take his consequence,” Cormier said of Velasquez’s sentencing. “He went to jail for a while, it was the saddest thing. I would go [to jail], sit with him, and the things we spoke about. It was so crazy because to me, he was the reason I knew I could be a world champ. Because out of our gym, he made it possible to dream that big. Watching the way he worked, watching how committed he was to becoming the best in the world. I knew that I could be the best…
“Then I sat there, you go to jail, and there’s this glass thing in between you and the person you get on the phone [with]…we’d have these great conversations…he was spending so much time by himself, 23 hours a day by himself, because of the confinement they had,” Cormier continued on Velasquez. “The celebrity aspect of it, they didn’t want to put him in general population, so he had to stay by himself all the time. He doesn’t know what’s going to happen, but we’re all pretty sure there’s going to be some sort of jail time. We hope it won’t be a lot, because he’s been doing the right things since he got out.” (h/t BJPenn)
Velasquez retired from MMA after a loss to Francis Ngannou in 2019. He’s regarded as one of the greatest UFC heavyweight champions of all time and could join Cormier in the UFC Hall of Fame.
