Things are not going well for New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez.
As was first reported by Sports Illustrated, investigators began searching Hernandez’s North Attleboro, Mass home Tuesday afternoon in connection with a homicide investigation. The victim, Oden Lloyd, a man who police say was an “associate” of Hernandez’s, was found shot in the head in an industrial park not far from a vehicle that had been rented by Hernandez.
During the search, two friends of Hernandez who were in the house tried to leave, but were stopped by police and their cars were searched. Investigators also left Hernandez’s home with a box.
As of Tuesday, Hernandez was not believed to be a suspect and according to ABC, was cooperative with investigators.
On Wednesday afternoon, law enforcement officials told a source that Hernandez has NOT been ruled out as a suspect, and is NOT cooperating with investigators (a detail many suspect actually means he has lawyered up).
And that is where things started to get a little crazy. Here’s what else we have learned today:
- According to WBZ-TV, Lloyd dated the sister of Hernandez’s girlfriend.
- Speaking of WBZ-TV, the Boston station seems to be following the entire situation closely and has provided frequent and interesting updates on the developing story. Peter Wilson, the managing editor of WBZ-TV in Boston, tweeted this afternoon that law enforcement sources told the station “that troopers found a gun in North Attleboro in the area where body was found.”
- Police plan to search the rental car registered under Hernandez’s name, per ABC News.
- According to TMZ, Hernandez was sued earlier this month for “allegedly shooting a man in the face following an altercation at a Miami strip club.” The TMZ “report” explains how Hernandez and the victim, Alexander S. Bradley, got into an argument outside of the strip club. After the argument dispersed, both men got into the same car, where Hernandez is supposed to have aimed a gun – that Bradley claims Hernandez did not have a license to carry – at Bradley and accidentally shot him. In his suit, Bradley claims to have suffered the loss of his right eye as a result of the incident.
The civil case was dismissed on June 17th due to a “paperwork error,” but Bradley and his lawyers do plan to re-open the case, per TMZ.
A Terez Owens tip dated April 4th of this year shows a document that appears to corroborate the TMZ story as does an update from WBZ-TV in Boston and SI’s Greg A. Bedard.
Hernandez did slip to the 4th round of the NFL draft due to “character concerns,” and while Hernandez may be guilty of no wrong-doing as it relates to the murder of Oden Lloyd, at the very least, it appears the tight end doesn’t exactly hang with the best crowd.
UPDATE: A copy of the June 14th lawsuit filed against Hernandez has hit the internet.
