Georgia running back Isaiah Crowell, who was in and out of Bulldogs coach Mark Richt’s doghouse as a freshman, was arrested on weapons charges by Athens-Clarke County police early Friday morning.
Crowell, from Columbus, Ga., was arrested and charged with two felonies and a misdemeanor, according to the Athens-Clarke County Jail Booking report.
Crowell was charged with a felony count of possessing a weapon in a school zone, a felony count of altered identification mark and misdemeanor count of possession/carrying a concealed weapon.
He was arrested around 2:20 a.m. ET after being stopped at a vehicle checkpoint near the Georgia campus and booked at 3:37 a.m. His bond was set at $7,500.
Under UGA Athletic Association policy, student-athletes charged with felonies are immediately suspended from the team.
Georgia senior associate athletics director Claude Felton said the school was aware of Crowell’s arrest. Felton said Richt was out of town.
An Athens-Clarke County Sheriff’s Department official said Crowell, 19, was still jailed later Friday morning.
According to a police report issued later Friday, the serial number on a 9mm Luger found under the driver’s seat had been scratched off completely, but Crowell denied knowing a gun was there, saying other people drive his car.
Police said the altered ID-mark charge stems from the tampered serial number. Crowell also said teammates Blake Tibbs, Quintavius Harrow, Josh Harvey-Clemons and Sheldon Dawson, who were passengers in the car, had just left a club called Aftermath, according to the police report.
The arresting Athens-Clarke County Police officer stated she smelled marijuana inside the 2005 Mercury Grand Marquis that Crowell was driving.
“[Crowell] consented to a search of the vehicle, and officers didn’t find the marijuana,” Athens-Clarke County Police spokeswoman Hilda Sorrow told ESPN.com on Friday morning. “There were other occupants inside the car and they consented to a search, but the marijuana wasn’t found. During the search of the vehicle, officers found a gun under the driver’s seat. After discovering that the ID number had been altered [on the gun], Mr. Crowell was arrested and charged. Marijuana was never found inside the car.”
Crowell, who was ranked as the country’s No. 1 running back and No. 4 prospect overall by ESPN Recruiting in 2011, had a rocky first season with the Bulldogs.
He ran 185 times for 850 yards with five touchdowns as a freshman but was dogged by disciplinary problems throughout the previous summer.
Crowell was benched for the first quarter of the Bulldogs’ 33-28 victory over Vanderbilt on Oct. 15 for disciplinary reasons and then was suspended for UGA’s 63-16 victory over New Mexico State.
Crowell was hampered by an ankle injury late in the season and ran only 15 times for 31 yards in the Bulldogs’ last four games.
He was booed by UGA fans after limping off the field with an ankle injury in the first half of the Bulldogs’ 42-10 loss to LSU in the SEC championship game at the Georgia Dome on Dec. 3.
Georgia signed two of the country’s most highly regarded running backs, Keith Marshall and Todd Gurley of North Carolina, in February to help take some of the load off Crowell this coming season.
Marshall, who enrolled at UGA in January after graduating from Millbrook High School in Raleigh, N.C., offered support for his Bulldogs teammate on Twitter on Friday morning: “Pray for Isaiah & that he will learn from his mistake.”
WRITTEN BY Mark Schlabach | ESPN.com - Information from DawgNation’s David Ching was used in this report & FULL STORY HERE
