Ex-Lakers, Grizzlies Player Sentenced to Eight Years in Prison

It has been three years since Ben McLemore was in the NBA. He had a nine-year NBA career that spanned the Sacramento Kings, Memphis Grizzlies, Los Angeles Lakers, Houston Rockets, and Portland Trail Blazers. The former seventh pick of the 2013 NBA Draft averaged 9 PPG for his career, peaking at 12.1 PPG with the Kings in his second season.

McLemore played overseas in China for a few years, hoping to find his way back to the NBA eventually. However, any chance of a possible comeback to the NBA is out the window now.

Apr 8, 2022; Dallas, Texas, USA; Portland Trail Blazers guard Ben McLemore (23) warms up before the game between the Dallas Mavericks and the Portland Trail Blazers at the American Airlines Center. Mandatory Credit: Jerome Miron-Imagn Images | Jerome Miron-Imagn Images

Last week, a Clackamas County (Oregon) Circuit Court jury found McLemore guilty of first-degree counts of sexual abuse and rape, with the judge handing McLemore a 100-month prison sentence. The incident occurred at the Lake Oswego house of Robert Covington, with whom McLemore was teammates in Portland, in October of 2021. Covington was not involved in this incident, though.

The victim had fallen asleep on the couch after heavily drinking at a house party and woke up to find McLemore sexually abusing her. Although McLemore and his attorney pleaded not guilty, saying she was sober enough to give consent, the jury still found McLemore guilty. There was an additional charge in the second count for sexual abuse that McLemore was found not guilty of.

Ben McLemore has been found guilty of raping a 21-year-old woman at a 2021 house party in Lake Oswego. He was convicted on 3 of 4 charges, including first-degree rape, per @KGWNews

“The jury found former Portland Trail Blazer Ben McLemore guilty Thursday morning of rape and… pic.twitter.com/2IUlPH6dKf
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) July 3, 2025

The victim appeared on video on Wednesday at McLemore's sentencing, saying, in part, "These last few years have often felt like a weight that I've had to drag behind me, a constant reminder of the trauma that I haven't been able to fully work through because there was no ending in sight. I now understand, on a deep level, why so many victims hesitate or never report what happened to them."

McLemore will now spend about as long behind bars as he did in the NBA, a disappointing fall-off for a once-talented player.

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