A shot glass connected to the ongoing rape investigation targeting former NFL Pro Bowler Darren Sharper tested positive for a drug police allege is used to render people defenseless.
According to TMZ, the L.A. County district attorney’s office filed documents this week that accuse the former New Orleans Saints star of drugging as many as 11 women in four different states and raping at least seven of them.
On the night of Nov. 20 alone, Sharper is accused of going home with as many as three different women he met that evening in a Scottsdale nightclub. Later that night, police now claim Sharper poured at least two of the women a shot and one of the glasses has since tested positive for the sleep-inducing drug Ambien.
The 38-year-old Sharper was formally charged in L.A. on Friday with two counts of rape by use of drugs, four counts of furnishing a controlled substance, and one count of possession, all felonies. He also faces ongoing investigations in Louisiana, Arizona, and Nevada. In all, he faces more than 30 years behind bar if convicted on all the charges.
Sharper is currently free on $200,000 bond, though prosecutors told reporters as early as next Friday they will seek to have the bail amount raised to $10 million in light of all their new evidence they’ve collected against him.
A five-time Pro Bowler, Sharper has also been suspended from his job as an analyst for the NFL Network. His L.A.- based attorney told CNN her client was looking forward to the true facts soon coming out. “We are very hopeful that at the end of day Mr. Sharper will be fully exonerated,” said Blair Berk.
A resident of Miami Beach, Florida, prosecutors allege Sharper was systematic in the way he staged most of his attacks. In most instances, he reportedly told the women he needed to make a stop at his hotel room after they left the club together. All of the alleged attacks took place at his hotel after he had given the women a drink.
“I believe that the defendant is involved in seven acts of rape and eleven acts of furnishing a controlled substance” in those three communities and the Los Angeles area between last September and January,” D.A. Ricardo Santiago told the court.
Sharper played 14 NFL seasons for the Saints, Green Bay Packers and Minnesota Vikings. He had 63 interceptions over his career, returning 11 for touchdowns and was named to the NFL’s 2000s All-Decade Team.
