New England Patriots wide receiver Stefon Diggs made his first court appearance of the offseason on Friday. The 32-year-old pleaded not guilty to felony strangulation charges brought about after an alleged incident with his personal chef in December.
The arraignment for the Dec. 2 incident was originally slated to take place on Jan. 23, but was moved to Feb. 13 due to a “previously scheduled professional commitment.”
His plea was the only significant outcome to play out at Friday’s court appearance. The judge scheduled Diggs to next appear for a pretrial hearing on April 1.
Diggs’s attorney, Michael Schuster, told reporters outside the courtroom that his client is completely innocent.
“We’re confident after the facts and evidence are reviewed in this case, he will be completely exonerated,” Schuster said.
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Diggs’s accuser maintains that the receiver “smacked her across the face” and “tried to choke her using the crook of his elbow around her neck.”
She maintains that she was denied payment by Diggs and was assaulted when she showed up to collect.
“Diggs threw her on a bed and said ‘lies’ when she told him she had not been paid, (Officer Kenneth) Ellis wrote,” Ryan Morik of Fox News wrote. “The chef sought payment for a week in November when Diggs was hosting house guests and had to go home, Ellis wrote. The woman ‘left her position’ and the home in Dedham but returned on Dec. 9 to retrieve her property. At that point, she told police, Diggs referred her to his assistant, who said she had to sign a nondisclosure agreement before she would be paid. She did not sign it, police said.”
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