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Adrian Peterson arrived at a Houston courthouse Friday morning but his hearing was reset to Aug. 6. In the week since the incident, disparate details of the night have emerged.
A week ago tonight, like many 20-somethings, Adrian Peterson and a couple of friends decided to have a night out in Houston. It was going to be a night to cut loose before the business of the NFL hit, especially for a franchise player whose last on-field play ended with an agonizing scream as the ligaments that protect the side and the back of his left knee suffered damage.
For Peterson, a week ago tonight was going to be a brief respite from keeping his pledge to be ready for Week 1 of the regular season. Instead, it turned out to be the biggest news night of his offseason.
Friday morning’s hearing in a Houston courthouse for resisting arrest was reset to Aug. 6. During this time, the district attorney assigned to the case, Carol Cumming, will decide how or if to proceed.
Rusty Hardin, the attorney representing Peterson, said he hopes to get the charges dismissed, saying multiple witnesses will say that Peterson didn’t shove an off-duty officer trying to clear the Live! at Bayou Place nightclub after closing, as the Houston Police Department contends.
Peterson said outside the courtroom that he is "200 percent innocent" and didn't "push, shove, touch anyone that night, especially an officer," according to the Associated Press.
"I didn't push, shove, touch anything to anyone that night, especially an officer," Peterson said, according to the Associated Press. "I definitely don't have a problem with the Houston P.D. This involves two individual officers that I have an issue with. Once everything is settled and (comes) to a head, the truth will come out."
As news began to surface about Peterson’s arrest, there wasn’t a lot that was known. One week later, many of the “facts” are still shrouded in controversy – a “he said, he said” scenario – but the picture is coming into clearer focus … and it doesn’t look nearly as bad for Peterson as it did last Saturday. Here’s what we know now.
Peterson is taking the charge against him seriously, potentially paying tens of thousands of dollars to Hardin’s team of lawyers and investigators to defend a charge that carries a minimal fine and likely no jail time.
The only charge Adrian Peterson is currently facing is “resisting arrest.”
Peterson claims he was hit in the face at least twice by the off-duty policemen trying to subdue him after he allegedly failed to leave the bar in a timely manner.
The promised surveillance tapes that would corroborate the initial officer accounts of the incident have yet to surface and Hardin said surveillance video that allegedly captured the altercation doesn’t exist.
Peterson appears willing to fight the matter to either get the charges dropped or let a jury decide his guilt or innocence.
Peterson, through his attorney, has strongly maintained his innocence.
The police account of the events has gone silent since the initial statement that portrayed Peterson as drunk and aggressive.
It’s clear that the Peterson incident from a week ago has opened a lot of eyes around the league as to what can happen when a celebrity has a night out on the town, but, as opposed to the first reports coming out last Saturday, the incident isn’t as cut-and-dried as it was initially made to sound.
There’s no questioning that the incident has given Peterson a public-relations black eye, but, given the two very disparate versions of the story being given, there are plenty of questions as to exactly what happened and the term “reasonable doubt” is going to creep into the discussion in the coming days and weeks.
Maybe the situation will simply go away and the case will be settled out of court without further incident before the Aug. 6 appearance. But, if anything comes out of this story, it may serve as a warning to young players that, if you’re a star in the NFL and you get into a dust-up, it’s going to make big news – for better or for worse.
A week ago tonight, like many 20-somethings, Adrian Peterson and a couple of friends decided to have a night out in Houston. It was going to be a night to cut loose before the business of the NFL hit, especially for a franchise player whose last on-field play ended with an agonizing scream as the ligaments that protect the side and the back of his left knee suffered damage.
For Peterson, a week ago tonight was going to be a brief respite from keeping his pledge to be ready for Week 1 of the regular season. Instead, it turned out to be the biggest news night of his offseason.
Friday morning’s hearing in a Houston courthouse for resisting arrest was reset to Aug. 6. During this time, the district attorney assigned to the case, Carol Cumming, will decide how or if to proceed.
Rusty Hardin, the attorney representing Peterson, said he hopes to get the charges dismissed, saying multiple witnesses will say that Peterson didn’t shove an off-duty officer trying to clear the Live! at Bayou Place nightclub after closing, as the Houston Police Department contends.
Peterson said outside the courtroom that he is "200 percent innocent" and didn't "push, shove, touch anyone that night, especially an officer," according to the Associated Press.
"I didn't push, shove, touch anything to anyone that night, especially an officer," Peterson said, according to the Associated Press. "I definitely don't have a problem with the Houston P.D. This involves two individual officers that I have an issue with. Once everything is settled and (comes) to a head, the truth will come out."
As news began to surface about Peterson’s arrest, there wasn’t a lot that was known. One week later, many of the “facts” are still shrouded in controversy – a “he said, he said” scenario – but the picture is coming into clearer focus … and it doesn’t look nearly as bad for Peterson as it did last Saturday. Here’s what we know now.
Peterson is taking the charge against him seriously, potentially paying tens of thousands of dollars to Hardin’s team of lawyers and investigators to defend a charge that carries a minimal fine and likely no jail time.
The only charge Adrian Peterson is currently facing is “resisting arrest.”
Peterson claims he was hit in the face at least twice by the off-duty policemen trying to subdue him after he allegedly failed to leave the bar in a timely manner.
The promised surveillance tapes that would corroborate the initial officer accounts of the incident have yet to surface and Hardin said surveillance video that allegedly captured the altercation doesn’t exist.
Peterson appears willing to fight the matter to either get the charges dropped or let a jury decide his guilt or innocence.
Peterson, through his attorney, has strongly maintained his innocence.
The police account of the events has gone silent since the initial statement that portrayed Peterson as drunk and aggressive.
It’s clear that the Peterson incident from a week ago has opened a lot of eyes around the league as to what can happen when a celebrity has a night out on the town, but, as opposed to the first reports coming out last Saturday, the incident isn’t as cut-and-dried as it was initially made to sound.
There’s no questioning that the incident has given Peterson a public-relations black eye, but, given the two very disparate versions of the story being given, there are plenty of questions as to exactly what happened and the term “reasonable doubt” is going to creep into the discussion in the coming days and weeks.
Maybe the situation will simply go away and the case will be settled out of court without further incident before the Aug. 6 appearance. But, if anything comes out of this story, it may serve as a warning to young players that, if you’re a star in the NFL and you get into a dust-up, it’s going to make big news – for better or for worse.