Why Did Plaxico Burress Glock Himself?
I love sports, and I love football. That's why it angers me when a famous sports figure does something so stupid that it beggars description. Case in point: Plaxico Burress, part of the Super Bowl champions New York Giants football team, shot himself in the leg at a nightclub over the weekend and, along with the hospital, is now facing all kinds of legal ramifications:
Burress arrived at the Latin Quarter nightclub in Manhattan at 1:20 a.m. Saturday morning, with four others, including two teammates.The criminal complaint, released by prosecutors Monday, said that an onlooker then saw Burress near the V.I.P. area of the club holding a drink in his left hand and fidgeting his right hand in the area of the waistline of his pants. The witness then heard a single “pop” sound before hearing Burress say, “Take me to the hospital.”
Burress was on the ground, with his legs shaking, when a bloody gun — a .40-caliber Glock pistol — fell out of his pant leg and onto the floor, the onlooker said. Investigators believe that [Giants linebacker Antonio] Pierce was standing next to Burress when the gun went off. The bullet, which broke through the skin of Burress’s right thigh and pierced muscle tissue, traveled through the leg before lodging itself somewhere in the club.
Burress left the club by 1:50 a.m., the police said, and arrived at the hospital at 2:04 a.m., according to surveillance cameras at the hospital.
The gun, with the magazine gone and the chamber cleared, was then placed in the glove compartment of Pierce’s S.U.V., said Browne, the police spokesman.
Pierce, who was interviewed by N.F.L. security at the Giants’ team hotel Saturday, is now under investigation for “his role, regarding the gun and the case itself,” Browne said. [...]
Burress checked into Weill Cornell Medical Center at 2:20 a.m., where he was treated and released at 1 p.m. Saturday. The police arrived an hour and a half later, tipped off, they say, by news reports, not the hospital. A hospital administrator there was “not forthright with the police,” Browne said.
After not talking to the police for a couple of days, Plaxico finally turned himself into police on Monday morning, and it is emerging that he faces a litany of charges, none of which involve football:
In what prosecutors called “a strong case,” Burress faces a mandatory sentence of 3 ½ years in state prison, with a maximum of 15 years, on each count of second-degree criminal possession of a weapon. Benjamin Brafman, Burress’s lawyer, said Burress planned to plead not guilty to both counts. Continued on the next page
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