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Click above for gallery of photos released by Clearwater, Florida police

Today in Clearwater, Florida, a judge sentenced Nick Bollea, son of famous WWE wrestler Hulk Hogan, to eight months in jail for reckless driving. Last August Bollea crashed his father's yellow modified Toyota Supra into a palm tree while street racing. Not only did he total the car, but his friend John Graziano who was riding shotgun that night will now require lifetime medical care for his critical injuries. The young Hogan was reportedly led off to serve his sentence immediately after it was handed down by the judge. In addition to the jail time, Bollea will also be on probation for five years and lose his drivers license for three. After all the hoopla that's led us to this point in Nick Bollea's tragic story, the only thing we can say is that the roads are probably safer tonight.


[Source: USA Today]

Click above for gallery of photos released by Clearwater, Florida police

John Graziano was riding shotgun when Nick Bollea, son of famed pro wrestler Terry Bollea, a.k.a. Hulk Hogan, lost control of his modified Toyota Supra and hit a tree in Clearwater, Florida one rainy night last August. As we all know by now, Hogan's son suffered minored injuries, but Graziano suffered massive head trauma that will likely leave him hospitalized for life. The Graziano family filed a lawsuit on Monday against Terry Bollea, which claims he bears responsibility for the accident because he was aware of his son's penchant for speed and competitive racing. Police believe Nick Bollea was racing another car that night driven by his friend, Daniel Jacobs, who is also named as a defendant in the lawsuit. Linda Bollea, who has filed for a divorce from her husband, is the third defendant named. While the lawsuit doesn't specify an amount of money that the Graziano family is seeking, it appears they'd just like enough to cover their son's medical expenses for the rest of his life, which could amount to millions.

We're not sure who's in the right here, as we don't know whether Graziano was wearing his seatbelt at the time and, being Bollea's friend, assume he was well aware of the younger Hogan's lust for speed and competitive nature, as well. The fact that one person's life has been tragically altered is what's particularly sad, all on account of illegal street racing. How much responsibility Graziano himself or the rest of the Hogan family bears is a matter for the courts to decide.


[Source: AOL Television]

Click above to view high-res gallery of images taken by police

Back in August 2007, the son of famed WWE Wrestler Hulk Hogan crashed his modded yellow Toyota Supra in Clearwater, Florida while allegedly street racing. Nick "Hogan" Bollea suffered minor injuries, but his friend riding shotgun at the time, John Graziano, suffered serious injuries including head trauma. Graziano now resides (and likely will for life) at a veteran's hospital in Haley, VA. Since then, Bollea has been charged with felony reckless driving involving serious bodily harm, as well as a host of other offenses including being underage while driving drunk.

The pictures we published from the scene that night show a totaled Supra, but it was dark and all one could see was a twisted yellow mass of metal with Supra headlights. We didn't fully appreciate how lucky both guys are to be alive until 20 minutes ago when we clicked through dozens of photos taken by the Clearwater, FL police department. They include pictures of the car both at the scene and in an evidence hanger, as well as shots of Bollea and Graziano in the hospital afterwards. We've assembled a batch of images in a gallery below for you, since the cops' full collection numbers in the hundreds and includes many near duplicate shots of the same thing. Thanks for the tip, felix!


[Source: My Fox Detroit]

The sordid saga surrounding Nick Hogan's high-speed crash that resulted in critical injuries to his shot-gun mate and best friend continues. TMZ.com reports that Clearwater, FL police arrested the son of pro-wrestler legend Hulk Hogan today and charged him with reckless driving, as well as issued citations for the use of a motor vehicle in a felony, operating a motor vehicle under the age of 21 with a blood alcohol level above .02, and, our favorite one – illegal window tinting. Being the celebrity news hounds they are, TMZ has continued to follow the story and published a statement made by Nick Hogan's rep in which the Hogan's actually call out John Graziano, the best-friend who was critically injured in the crash, for not wearing his seat belt. Wow. In light of Mr. Graziano's apparent disregard for his own safety (as if driving in a car with Nick Hogan wasn't enough evidence of that), the Hogan clan, a.k.a. the Bollea family, plans to increase public awareness about wearing your seatbelt. We expect the senior Hogan to grab the mic and hit the top rope to order all his little Hulkamaniacs out there to say their prayers, take their vitamins and always, ALWAYS wear their seatbelts.

[Source: TMZ.com, booking photo from TMZ.com]

In his first blog post since the horrific crash that totaled his dad's high-performance Toyota Supra and left his best friend in critical condition, Nick Hogan (real last name Bollea, son of famous WWE wrestler Hulk Hogan) claimed that after being dropped by the Mopar drifting team, he picked up Polaroid as a new title sponsor. Many of you in the comments questioned how Polaroid could think that slapping its name on Nick Hogan's twin-turbo drifting 350z could be a good PR move, and Polaroid happens to agree. Late last week the camera company came out and made explicitly clear that it is not sponsoring Hogan for the 2008 racing season. Nevertheless, Hogan still lists the company as a sponsor on his website. Interestingly, in response to Hogan's blog post and the little dust storm that's been kicked up over his sponsorship, the lawyer of his best friend who suffered permanent injuries from the crash commented that "the young driver should keep a low profile until the matter is resolved." That's some good advice. Take it, Nick.

Thanks for the tip, catgirlshyla!

[Source: TBO.com]

Back in late August, Nick Hogan, the son of everyone's fave wrastler Hulk Hogan, wrecked his dad's $50,000 Toyota Supra in Clearwater, Florida. While Hogan was wearing a seatbelt and emerged relatively OK, his passenger, friend John Graziano, was not and will likely need life long care for his injuries.

We haven't heard so much as a peep from Nick since the crash. It's very serious considering that the police know he was racing another car on city streets in the rain and ignoring traffic lights and signs. On top of that, the police are waiting for results from his drug tests to determine if he was also impaired while driving. So when Nick posted for the first time on his MySpace page since the accident, some were a little shocked at the contents (read them in full after the jump). Nick talks about losing his ride with Mopar in pro drifting, but sounds excited about his new title sponsor Polariod. Next season he'll apparently be fielding his own team with a pair of Nissan 350Zs. He finishes his post by asking for luck for the '08 season and to keep his friend, John Graziano, in your prayers.

What we're surprised by is not the fact that Nick will be drifting competitively again, although we think he's proven time and again that competitive racing of any form is not his strong suit. No, what surprises us is that his parents, the Hulkster himself, would let him get behind the wheel of a high-horsepower car again. We're also presuming the elder Hogan has bankrolled Nick's newest venture, since we've never known the young Hulk to be gainfully employed and have money of his own. Well, here's hoping that Nick confines his high-performance driving to the track this time.

[Source: TMZ]