Surprise! Former NHL Brute is IRL Brute
It’s a sad story that produced a fantastic mugshot.
Dale Purinton used to get paid to be an abusive thug. Earlier this week he was arrested for it. On Wednesday, the former NHL enforcer was charged for breaking into an upstate New York house, knocking around the homeowner and running away before the police arrived.
It’s not a very surprising event in the life of a guy who spent 578 minutes in the penalty box in only 181 NHL games. Purinton’s role on the New York Rangers was to punch and get punched, which means he was both trained to be violent and subjected to brain damage. If that’s not the profile of bug-eyed burglar, I don’t know what is.
Ex-Ranger Dale Purinton charged in Central NY burglary. That mugshot, though. http://t.co/Rz0lGMQeZc pic.twitter.com/s7Kd2s4CAm
— WFAN Sports Radio (@WFAN660) August 21, 2015
In his entire career Purinton scored four goals. For some context, a single player has scored five or more goals in a single game 60 different times. So, essentially, Purinton was terrible at hockey. Not that he doesn’t have his own accomplishments to be proud of though. For example, there was that time he almost popped guy’s eyeball out of his head.
Photos by Bruce Bennett Studios/Getty Images
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