Posted: 10/12/2006 2:54:11 PM EDT
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Chargers Player Shot by Off-Duty Officer Facing Charges Updated: October 12th, 2006 11:08 AM EDT Story by nbcsandiego.com The district attorney has filed charges against Chargers player Steve Foley, who was shot by an off-duty police officer last month. On Wednesday, officials announced that they had filed two misdemeanor driving-under-the influence charges against the linebacker. An arraignment is scheduled for a week from Wednesday. Each charge carries a maximum sentence of one year in jail. According to police reports, at 3:30 a.m. on Sept. 3, Foley was driving erratically when Mansker began to follow him. After Mansker reportedly observed the vehicle weaving and its speed ranging from 30 mph to 90 mph, he ordered Foley to pull over at a red light, but Foley drove away in his restored 1971 Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme. For nearly 30 miles, Mansker followed behind in his black Mazda, ordering Foley's car to pull over to no avail. Mansker called the California Highway Patrol, but was told no units were in the area. Finally, when Foley reached his home, he emerged from the car and was confronted by Mansker. According to a taped interview with investigators obtained by the San Diego Union-Tribune, Mansker said Foley "kept coming toward me" and that he identified himself as a police officer and told Foley to stop before drawing his gun and firing a warning shot. But Foley kept nearing, and reached into his waistband. "I thought for sure he's going to pull his gun and I'm gone," Mansker told investigators. He fired his gun several times and hit Foley three times, twice in the lower left leg and once in the thigh. But Lisa Maree Gaut, who was Foley's passenger, offered a different account. She told investigators that she never heard Mansker identify himself as a police officer and said she and Foley were under the belief that Foley was being followed because he is a professional athlete. Gaut has been charged with drunken driving and assault. Prosecutors said she got behind the wheel of Foley's car and tried to run Mansker down after the shooting. She is out on bail and faces up to five years in prison if convicted of all charges |
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San Diego Linebacker Foley Pleads Not Guilty to Misdemeanor DUI Charges Updated: October 17th, 2006 10:08 AM EDT City News Service Chargers linebacker Steve Foley pleaded not guilty today to misdemeanor DUI charges stemming from a confrontation with an off-duty Coronado police officer, who shot him three times near his Poway home. Foley's attorney, Jack Phillips, sent in the football player's denial by fax, and a readiness conference was set for Nov. 17. A defendant is not required to appear in court to answer misdemeanor charges. The 31-year-old Foley is charged with DUI within 10 years of a prior conviction on such a charge, and with driving with a blood-alcohol level of more than the .08 legal limit. The second charge carries an allegation that the blood-alcohol level was more than .15. Officer Aaron Mansker has said he followed Foley's car in the early morning hours of Sept. 3 because he suspected the driver was drunk. During the course of the subsequent investigation, it was learned that Foley thought he was either being followed by a fan or being carjacked by the person following him, sheriff's homicide Detective Thomas Ness wrote in an affidavit for a search warrant. Mansker, driving an unmarked car, had followed Foley to the football player's home after allegedly seeing his car swerving across freeway lanes and traveling at speeds up to 90 mph. Foley eventually stopped and got out of the car to confront Mansker. When he allegedly refused to halt and appeared to reach into his pants, the officer fired a round into a bush as a warning, then shot the football player, who was hospitalized for several weeks. The officer also opened fire on his companion, Lisa Maree Gaut, when she allegedly accelerated the Oldsmobile toward him, but she was uninjured. A preliminary hearing is scheduled tomorrow for Gaut, who is charged with felony assault with a deadly weapon with force likely to produce great bodily injury and assault with a deadly weapon on a peace officer. She also faces misdemeanor charges of driving under the influence of alcohol and driving with a measurable blood-alcohol above the legal limit of .08. According to search warrant affidavits, a sample of Foley's blood revealed a .23 blood-alcohol level, taken at 4:29 a.m. on Sept. 3. On Sept. 13, Ness said he learned from the Sheriff's Crime Lab that Foley's blood-alcohol level measured .16 and Gaut's blood-alcohol level measured .15. The sample of blood revealing that result was taken from Foley at 6:45 a.m. on Sept. 3, according to the affidavits. According to the affidavits, Ness said it was explained to him that hospital blood-alcohol test results consistently measure higher than a criminalist's results due to hospital testing methods. Foley has been put on the Chargers' "reserve non-football injury" list, a move that has sidelined him for the season, costing him his $1.65 million salary. Mansker, 23, will remain on administrative leave pending resolution of investigations into the shooting, according to the Coronado Police Department. Judge Jeffrey Fraser has issued a gag order that prohibits the lawyers in the case from talking about possible steroid use, polygraphs and witness credibility. |