Former NFL player Zac Stacy was arrested in Florida on Thursday after video posted online appeared to show him attacking his ex-girlfriend in front of their infant son.
Stacy, 30, was charged with aggravated battery and criminal mischief, according to Orange County Jail records. The incident happened Saturday, according to an arrest warrant issued earlier Thursday by Oakland, Florida, police.
Stacy’s ex-girlfriend, Kristin Evans, posted footage captured by two surveillance cameras inside her home to Facebook on Wednesday, asking people to “please share” because at that stage Stacy was “yet to be apprehended.”
It appears to show the former New York Jets running back punching her in the head and throwing her into a TV while their infant son lay on the couch nearby.
He was taken into custody at Orlando International Airport after getting off a flight from Nashville, Tennessee.
The arrest warrant from the Oakland Police Department describes Stacy picking up Evans like “a rag doll.” She suffered injuries to her face, torso and legs, the warrant says.
NBC News has reached out to Stacy and his team for comment. The former athlete made his first court appearance Friday and his defense attorney said Stacy had flown from Tennessee to Florida immediately after learning there was a warrant for his arrest, according to the Orlando Sentinel.
The attorney said Stacy came back to Florida “with the intention of turning himself in,” the newspaper reported.
Prosecutors said in court that Stacy had left the state “immediately” after the alleged assault, and asked the judge to order him to surrender his passport if he’s granted release.
The judge agreed and set Stacy’s bond at just over $10,000, the Orlando Sentinel reported. He’s not allowed to have any contact with his ex-girlfriend and cannot possess any firearms or weapons.
Stacy said he intends to return to Tennessee, according to the newspaper.
In an interview with Telemundo, NBCUniversal’s Spanish language network, Evans described Stacy “body-slamming” her into their baby’s bouncy chair.
“I just wanted to make sure that I stayed conscious. He was in a rage,” Evans told Telemundo. “I just was scared, so I tried to calm him as much as I could, to deescalate the situation, and stay conscious. That’s all that was going through my head at the time.”
The videos were widely shared on social media and condemned by NFL players and fans.
“Any man that puts his hands on a woman is a coward. Can’t believe what I just saw,” Packers receiver Davante Adams tweeted.
“Woke up to the Zac Stacy video. Made my stomach turn,” Chris Long, who was Stacy’s teammate with the St. Louis Rams, said.
The TransPerfect Music City Bowl, a post-season college football game, dropped Stacy as its youth ambassador Thursday, saying in a statement it was terminating its relationship with him immediately.
Evans told Telemundo that this was not the first time Stacy had been violent, including an alleged incident in August when she “made a report for domestic violence” and ended the relationship. She said “there was another time I filed for domestic battery: He slapped me in the face while I was holding our son,” but did not say when.
The Oakland Police Department arrest warrant mentions two previous alleged incidents: One on Aug. 16 that it describes as a “verbal dispute,” and another Sept. 26 when charges were filed for “possible domestic violence” but that police “were unable to locate Mr. Stacy.”
On Saturday, Stacy sent a text message to Evans asking to visit their son, something she allowed as an “olive branch” as the couple were in mediation, she told police according to the arrest warrant.
Evans told Telemundo that Stacy became angry after they discussed “what he thought was an incident” a year ago when she met one of his friends who at the time was acting as Stacy’s financial adviser.
Minyvonne Burke contributed.
Source: | This article originally belongs to Nbcnews.com
