Report: Five Kentucky Football Players Suing Lexington Police Officer

Five current and former University of Kentucky football players are suing a Lexington police officer, almost one year after being cleared of burglary charges. 

LEX18 reports that Andru Phillips, Vito Tisdale, Reuben Adams, JuTahn McClain, and Joel Williams filed separate lawsuits Wednesday against the police department, the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government, Police Chief Lawrence Weathers, and two individual police officers, Cory Vinlove and Lt. Donnell Gordon. 

In March 2021, six players were apart of a fight that occurred at an Alpha Sigma Phi party in Lexington. The UK Office of Student Conduct cleared all six players from any wrongdoing in June 2021, yet they were charged with first-degree burglary charges later that year in August. A grand jury later dismissed the charges in late September 2021, saying the evidence against the players was false and fabricated.

The player's attorneys say the false charges led to their temporary suspensions, harmed their football, education and professional careers and defamed their names, images, and likenesses.

Of the six players, Phillips, Tisdale and McClain remain on Kentucky's team. Adams, Williams and Earnest Sanders, the lone player who did not file a lawsuit, have since transferred. 

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