New York Jets defensive lineman Sheldon Richardson has pled not guilty to traffic and resisting arrest charges stemming from a high-speed car chase earlier this summer in Missouri.
Richardson didn’t attend the hearing for the charges and wasn’t required to do so. Instead, he was represented by Matthew D. Fry, who is “an attorney who works for the same St. Louis-based law firm as Richardson’s defense attorney of record, Scott Rosenblum,” per Newsday.
The hearing has been bumped to October 5, and Richardson isn’t required to attend that hearing, either.
Richardson avoided charges of child endangerment and marijuana possession/use while driving after the district attorney couldn’t prove either charge.
Here are the details of the current charges:
Richardson was charged with resisting arrest — a Class A misdemeanor that can lead to up to a year in prison and a $1,000 fine — and several traffic violations after Missouri police said he tried to elude cops during an alleged street race. Police clocked Richardson, a Missouri native, going 143 mph with a 12-year-old relative and a concealed loaded gun in the car, according to a police report.
Richardson is also suspended for the first four games of the upcoming NFL season for violating the NFL’s drug policy—a suspension that was levied just two weeks before the incident that these current charges revolve around.
The Jets have decided to work with him, rather than to release him, but another mistake of this magnitude would almost certainly result in Richardson being cut from the team.
Another suspension is almost certainly looming—something Richardson calls “a cloud over my head.”
“When I get the date that I can actually return, then I can actually start moving forward,” Richardson told reporters on Aug. 26.
“I don’t know what to expect,” he added, referring to the additional discipline he could face from the league. “That’s out of my hands. Whatever happens happens . . . I can go from four games to however long he wants it to be. So it’s pretty tough.”
A Pro Bowler in 2014 and the league’s Defensive Rookie of the Year in 2013, Richardson possesses top-tier talent. Should he turn his life around, then there is no telling what feats he could accomplish on the field.
Perhaps he’ll take a lesson from Aldon Smith, who is currently without a job after his fifth arrest during his tenure with the San Francisco 49ers. If not, then Richardson will find himself on the same list of players who wasted their immense talent.