Transgender mixed martial arts fighter Fallon Fox can continue to compete in bouts as a woman in Florida after a state agency dismissed a complaint about her license.
Fox did not commit a violation when she applied to get her license from the Florida State Boxing Commission, the Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation said in a new ruling provided to NBC 6 on Wednesday.
The department investigated whether Fox committed fraud or deceit when she secured her MMA license, but determined that she did not, Assistant General Counsel Roger Maas wrote.
Fox – who used to be a man and now identifies as a woman – is set to fight Allana Jones at the University of Miami’s BankUnited Center in Coral Gables May 24.
Fox knocked out Erika Newsome in just 39 seconds in a March 2 bout at the BankUnited Center. She announced afterward that she used to be a man.
Fox has an unfair advantage over female opponents in terms of speed, power and aggression, former professional fighter Mickey Demos told NBC 6 earlier this week.
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In his ruling, Maas said that Fox applied for a license with the California State Athletic Commission on Feb. 8, and five days later the CSAC sent her a “license payment receipt” which included a cutout section that she believed to be her license.
When Fox applied to the Florida State Boxing Commission as an MMA participant on March 1, she indicated that she was licensed in California. But a week later the CSAC’s executive director, Andy Foster, confirmed to a DBPR investigator that Fox still wasn’t fully licensed because her application was under a medical review, according to Maas.
Foster acknowledged that the receipt cutout could be mistaken for a license, but maintained that the license was not valid until the application had been fully processed, Maas wrote.
Fox told the DBPR in an affidavit, “I had a reasonable belief that this document is a license, and I have no reason to believe that this document is not a license. No from the [CSAC] has informed me otherwise.”
Maas ordered the case closed.
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Photo Credit: Courtesy Championship Fighting Alliance