The Yoel Romero lawsuit ended with a $27.45 million default judgment against supplement maker Gold Star Performance Products in May 2019, which a New Jersey appellate court modified down to $12.45 million in June 2021. The UFC middleweight and Olympic silver medalist sued after a contaminated pre-workout product called Shred Rx caused him to fail a 2015 drug test and draw a six-month suspension.
Why Romero Sued
On December 16, 2015, the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency collected an out-of-competition sample from Romero in Miami. It came back positive for ibutamoren, a growth hormone secretagogue banned in competition. USADA traced the substance to Shred Rx, a Gold Star product that did not list ibutamoren on its label.1ESPN. Romero Wins Judgment in Tainted Supplement Suit
Because Romero was able to prove the source was a contaminated supplement rather than intentional use, his sanction was reduced from a two-year ban to a six-month suspension effective January 12, 2016. A separate fight-night test at UFC 194 on December 12, 2015 came back clean, so his win that night stood.2USADA. Yoel Romero Accepts Sanction
The Claims and the Court
Romero filed suit in Middlesex County, New Jersey, in December 2017. The complaint alleged negligence, strict products liability, breach of implied warranties, intentional misrepresentation, and violations of the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act. It accused Gold Star of failing to maintain its production facility and of selling a supplement contaminated with ibutamoren without disclosing it on the ingredients list.3Pepperdine Graziadio Business School. UFC Yoel Romero Sues Supplement Maker
He was represented by Jeffrey S. Craig of Craig, Annin & Baxter in Woodbury, New Jersey; anti-doping specialist Howard L. Jacobs of Westlake Village, California; and R. Daniel Fleck of The Spence Law Firm in Jackson, Wyoming.4The Spence Law Firm. $27M Award Secured for UFC Star Yoel Romero
How the $27.45 Million Was Calculated
Gold Star never responded. The company filed no papers, retained no counsel, and did not appear. A default judgment on liability was entered on December 7, 2018, and on May 28, 2019 the trial court awarded damages.1ESPN. Romero Wins Judgment in Tainted Supplement Suit
The compensatory portion came to $9 million, split three ways:
- $3 million for lost wages
- $3 million for reputational harm
- $3 million for emotional distress
The court then trebled those amounts under the New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act, which allows tripled damages for deceptive business practices. That produced the headline figure of $27.45 million.5Yahoo Sports. Yoel Romero UFC Lawsuit Supplement Suspension Because the case resolved by default, there was no discovery, no jury, and no adversarial testing of the causal link between Shred Rx and the positive test, though USADA had reached that conclusion in its own investigation.1ESPN. Romero Wins Judgment in Tainted Supplement Suit
Whether Romero Would Actually Collect
The size of the number and Gold Star’s total absence from the case pointed in opposite directions. Romero’s manager, Abraham Kawa, told reporters he was not sure the full amount would ever be recovered and estimated the team would collect at least $5 million.1ESPN. Romero Wins Judgment in Tainted Supplement Suit
The Appeal and the $12.45 Million Modified Award
Gold Star did eventually surface, appealing to the New Jersey Superior Court, Appellate Division. In a published opinion dated June 24, 2021, in Yoel Romero v. Gold Star Distribution, LLC d/b/a Gold Star Performance Products (Case No. A-0379-20), the appellate court upheld the finding that Gold Star violated the Consumer Fraud Act and sustained the trebled damages on one category.6NJ Courts. Yoel Romero vs. Gold Star Distribution, et al.
The court modified another portion of the judgment and remanded the reputational harm damages for further consideration by the trial court. The result was a modified award of $12,450,000, with room to grow depending on what the trial court did on remand.7CCM Lawyers. Appellate Division Upholds Multi-Million Dollar Judgment in MMA Fighter’s Shed Rx Contamination Case
What Romero’s Career Looked Like Around the Case
The suspension landed in the middle of Romero’s title run. After serving it, he beat former champion Chris Weidman in November 2016, then lost a unanimous decision to Robert Whittaker for the interim middleweight title at UFC 213 in July 2017.5Yahoo Sports. Yoel Romero UFC Lawsuit Supplement Suspension The lawsuit tied the damages claim to that arc, citing lost wages, lost future contracts, and the reputational cost of being publicly linked to a failed drug test.4The Spence Law Firm. $27M Award Secured for UFC Star Yoel Romero