Later, Brown was arrested on suspicion of sexual assault after a woman claimed he forced sex on her in his home after game three of the 2006 playoff series against the Phoenix Suns. Police dropped the charges after an exam showed no signs of sexual assault. Brown subsequently released a statement that was remarkable if only for its uncomfortable use of the word “stain,” given the context: “And even when the truth is finally determined, the stain of an allegation remains with no real recourse against or penalty to the accuser.”
Give Brown 18 points for the pointless pre-training-camp arrest. Had he gone another week without trouble, he’d be relaxing in Honolulu with the rest of the Lakers, sipping drinks with paper umbrellas. But instead he had to get all verbal and such with a bunch of dumb, rural Georgia cops. Not too bright. Oh, and by the way, as a player, the guy sucks ass.
What did Brown do to you?
Meanwhile, another NBA Brown — former Michigan State Spartan star and current Cleveland Cavalier guard Shannon Brown — was involved in a completely different sort of incident. Brown was at a Cleveland nightclub called Liquid with teammates Drew Gooden and Larry Hughes. All three of the men were wearing baseball caps. At first, club officials asked the players to remove the hats. Then, after Brown and company informed them who they were, they were allowed to keep them on.
But bouncers at the club balked, and Brown was tossed out of the club for a dress-code violation. After trying to find his teammates at another entrance to the club, some bouncers apparently jumped on Brown, stuck a knee on the back of his neck and kept him pinned to the ground. Way to help out the guard-starved home team, Clevelanders.
Brown’s filed assault charges against the bouncers. Let’s see if, as punishment, the courts send them into the Cavs locker room for 10 unsupervised minutes.
What can Brown set on fire for you?
And finally, in this all-Brown edition of “Blotter,” former University of Louisville basketball player Erik Brown was sentenced to five years probation and also ordered to live with his mother and take psychotropic medication, after setting a fire in his Kentucky home in August 2006.
Brown, who has been diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, was apparently trying to commit suicide by sitting in a burning room. He was on probation for felony theft at the time of the arrest, and ended up pleading guilty but mentally ill to criminal mischief for the fire charge.
No more sports Browns were arrested this past week, but we’ll keep you posted.
When he’s not googling “purloined pastry” and “NBA cap violations,” Matt Taibbi writes for Rolling Stone. He can be reached at M_Taibbi@yahoo.com.
