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VCU's Mo Alie-Cox charged with misdemeanor assault and battery

VCU forward Mo Alie-Cox was charged with misdemeanor assault and battery stemming from an incident in which a woman allegedly made a comment about former Rams coach Shaka Smart.
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VCU forward Mo Alie-Cox was charged with misdemeanor assault and battery stemming from an incident in which a woman allegedly made a comment about former Rams coach Shaka Smart, reports WTVR in Richmond, Va.

Cox was charged on April 30 after the accuser filed a police report regarding the April 3 incident at a Richmond nightspot. The accuser said the incident began when she walked by a group of men and a woman at a restaurant in the Shockoe Slip district in downtown Richmond. The other woman allegedly told the accuser not to look in the her direction.

"I said I could look where ever I pleased and she responded with a comment I did not here [sic] and got in my face," the complainant wrote in the court document. "A VCU basketball player made a comment with me responding 'it's not my fault Shaka Smart left. Is that why your [sic] mad?'"

Smart, the former VCU head coach, told the Rams he was leaving to take Texas' head coaching job on April 2.

WTVR reports that after the accuser made the comment about Smart, the other woman shoved her.

The complainant said she then accidentally grabbed the other woman's hair. That is when Alie-Cox allegedly entered the picture, the woman said.

"Mo Alie-Cox punched me in the face," she wrote in the criminal complaint. "I went to the bouncer to ask for help and Mo Alie-Cox left."

The woman said when she later approached Alie-Cox about the incident, he denied touching her. The woman then filed the criminal report.

Cox is due back in court May 20. VCU athletics director Ed McLaughlin said the program was aware of the charges and would continue to monitor the situation closely.

Alie-Cox averaged 25.9 minutes per game as a sophomore last season, averaging 7.4 points, 5.7 rebounds and 1.9 blocks per game.

Mike Fiammetta