Former Detroit Lions cornerback Alex Brown was sentenced to four months in Wayne County jail for a charge of operating a vehicle with a high blood-alcohol content for his role in a 2021 crash that injured a teammate.
Brown entered a nolo contendre plea on Jan. 23, Wayne County Circuit Court records show, and was sentenced March 31. He also received two years of probation and paid $778 in court costs and fines, and had two counts of reckless driving causing serious impairment and one count of operating under the influence causing serious injury dismissed.
WDIV-TV first reported the plea.
Brown was arrested around 2:13 a.m. on Aug. 15, 2021, after a crash in which he was driving the wrong way on southbound I-75 near I-375 in Detroit.
Brown struck a 27-year-old Detroit man’s car head-on, causing injury to the man’s legs. Then-Lions tight end Charlie Taumoepeau was a passenger in Brown’s car at the time of the accident. Taumoepeau was removed from the vehicle with the jaws of life, placed on a backboard and in a cervical collar and transported to a local hospital.
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Prosecutors said in court Brown registered a .211 blood alcohol level on a portable breathalyzer and was so drunk he thought he was in Atlanta returning from a strip club at the time of the accident.
The Lions cut Brown hours after the accident, and waived Taumoepeau with a non-football injury designation. Taumoepeau spent the season on the team’s reserve/non-football injury list after he cleared waivers.
Both players appeared late in the Lions’ preseason-opening loss to the Buffalo Bills the night before the accident.
Taumoepeau, who injured his neck and fractured his fibula in the accident, returned to football for the first time this spring. He was taken in the 14th round of the XFL’s supplemental draft by the St. Louis BattleHawks and traded to the Seattle Sea Dragons in late January.
Contact Dave Birkett at dbirkett@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @davebirkett.