Tennessee Football Players Face Armed Robbery Charges
Thursday, November 12, 2009
KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Three freshman Tennessee football players are charged with an attempted armed robbery.
According to Knoxville police, wide receiver Nu'Keese Richardson and defensive back Janzen Jackson and Mike Edwards were arrested after the early Thursday morning incident.
The victims told police they were sitting in their parked vehicle at a gas station near Tennessee's campus when two males, one brandishing a handgun, approached.
The two suspects demanded whatever the victims had. When the victims showed they had no money, the suspects joined a third man in a Toyota Prius and left.
Police located a Toyota Prius matching the description and the victims identified Richardson and Edwards as the men who approached the vehicle.
Officers say they found a pellet gun, drug paraphernalia and a plastic bag containing what appeared to be marijuana.
Tennessee athletic director Mike Hamilton says he is evaluating the incident.
So what’s Lane Kiffin going to talk about now?
9:47 am November 12, 2009, by Jeff Schultz
Lane Kiffin has done a lot of talking. What's he going to say now?
Lane Kiffin has done a lot of talking since being hired. Is he going to be tongue-tied now?
This should not be construed as celebrating the fact that three young men at Tennessee just irreparably damaged their football futures and possibly their lives with an unbelievably dumb decision. But a lot of people are laughing at Lane Kiffin right now.
Back on national letter-of-intent day in February, Kiffin, the new Tennessee coach, entertained Volunteer fans with a story about one of the team’s hot new recruits, Nu’Keese Richardson (video below). It seems Richardson, who also was being heavily recruited by Florida, was receiving cell phone calls from Gators coach Urban Meyer while he was taking his visit on the Tennessee campus. Kiffin told the crowd at signing day that such a move was illegal and Meyer was “cheating.” Problem was, it isn’t illegal and Meyer wasn’t cheating. That’s one of several times Kiffin has gotten into trouble for something he said since being hired.
That adds some irony to what happened early Thursday morning. Richardson was one of three Tennessee football players arrested and charged with armed robbery after trying to rob people outside of a convenience store at 2 a.m. All three players were prized recruits: Richardson, a freshman wide receiver from Pahokee, Fla.; Janzen Jackson, a freshman defensive back from Lake Charles, La.; Michael Edwards, a freshman defensive back from Cleveland.
We can’t predict how this case unfolds. But everybody who has been waiting to jump on Kiffin for something just got their wish. He actually has done a solid coaching job this season, given what he had to work with. The Vols are 5-4 and drilled Georgia, 45-19, and had narrow losses to the top two teams in the nation, Florida and Alabama.
But this will be a distraction unlike any Kiffin has dealt with so far. Even if this was some random act of three teenagers, some will ask now if it’s a reflection of the coach’s first recruiting class or his program. Fair? Not at all. But when you come into a high-profile job in the SEC and seem intent on stirring things up, be prepared for what’s going to happen when something goes wrong
Trouble in Tennessee
November 12, 2009 10:53 AM
Posted by ESPN.com's Chris Low
Two days before a key road trip to Ole Miss, Lane Kiffin faces the first real crisis of his Tennessee head coaching career.
Three of his players, all guys he recruited, were arrested early Thursday morning on attempted armed robbery charges after police said they attempted to rob some people sitting in a car outside a convenience store in Knoxville.
According to police, a powered pellet gun was found in the car the players were in after they were stopped by police near the dormitory on campus where the freshman players live at Tennessee.
Kiffin hasn't made any comment yet and probably won't until he gathers more facts about the case.
Jackson already has a couple of strikes against him, but if you read the police report, it sounds like he might not have been with the other two players when they actually went up to the car and tried to rob the victims.
Here's the other thing: Jackson is the best player among the three and one of the top freshmen in the SEC this season. So it will be interesting to see if he has a chance to survive and the other two don't. His failed drug test, one of the things that led to his suspension from the Memphis game last week won't help him.
Either way, Tennessee needs to act swiftly and decisively.
There's also a little cruel irony here for the Vols.
Remember Kiffin jokingly saying two weeks ago that maybe the Vols had earned a little "street cred" after rapper Lil Wayne dropped a reference to Kiffin talking (bleep) in one of his recent songs?
Well, this is the kind of "street cred" no program wants and can be poison for recruiting.
