Donovan McNabb, the retired NFL quarterback who led the Philadelphia Eagles to the Super Bowl in 2004 and to four NFC Championship games in his 11 years with the team, was arrested in January for some sort of traffic offense, but news of the bust became public only today.
The arrest took place in Maricopa County, Arizona, apparently on January 6 according to a document released by the county . But why the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Department waited until April 17 to publicize the news remains puzzling.
To be precise, the sheriff’s department did not exactly publicize the “news” of the Donovan McNabb arrest — it simply released a mug shot of McNabb with no explanation.
MCSO has released a mugshot of former Eagles QB Donovan McNabb. More details to come. pic.twitter.com/QpnNVMV2IR
— AZ Family (@azfamily) April 17, 2014
The rest of the details were filled in by the celebrity stalking site TMZ — sort of. The TMZ site has two news items that differ somewhat in their details . The first says that Donovan McNabb was arrested on December 15 of last year. He was speeding, TMZ reported, going 81 mph in a 65 mph zone in a Grey Land Rover at 3:08 am.
The arresting officers determined that McNabb was legally intoxicated and booked him for DUI. Or so says the initial TMZ report. The site then updated its story, saying that the mug shot came from January DUI arrest. But TMZ was not clear whether the December and January reports referred to two different incidents, or were the same.
The online document posted by the Maricopa Sheriff’s Office lists a “Criminal Traffic” case against Donovan Jamal McNabb on January 6. The document says the case was “adjudicated,” but gives no further detail on the charge or circumstances of the case.
The sheriff in Maricopa County is Joe Arpaio, who bills himself as “America’s toughest sheriff,” but who has also been under federal investigation for racial profiling. In fact, Arpaio was caught on video openly ridiculing a federal judge’s ruling last year that Arpaio and his deputies blatantly discriminated against Latinos throughout his 20-year reign as county sheriff.
Arpaio has cost his county millions in legal expenses defending lawsuits against his department over tactics used by Arpaio and his deputies.
No comment yet from Donovan McNabb on his situation in Maricopa County.
