Ex-NFL star Antonio Brown to accept plea deal in attempted murder case
Former NFL star Antonio Brown has accepted a plea deal that will reduce the charge of attempted second-degree murder he’s facing in Florida to aggravated assault, his attorney told The Times on Wednesday.
The move will result in a significantly lighter sentence for the Super Bowl LV champion, according to attorney Mark Eiglarsh, who said Brown would receive three years of probation with the possibility of early termination after half that time is served.
A conviction for the first-degree felony of attempted second-degree murder with a firearm would have brought a prison sentence of 20 to 30 years.
Eiglarsh added that Brown will be given a withholding of adjudication, meaning he will not be considered a convicted felon. He also said that the main requirement of Brown’s probation is simply “staying away from the alleged victim, which he has no problem doing.”
“No community service hours,” Eiglarsh said. “No anger management. No evaluation psychologically. No drug treatment, no evaluations for anything like that. No letter of apology, no fines, nothing.”
A spokesperson for the Miami-Dade County state attorney’s office would not confirm that a plea deal had been reached, stating in an email that “whatever is to transpire regarding an open & pending case will be fully clarified at the next hearing,” which is scheduled for Sept. 30.
A warrant was issued for Brown’s arrest in June 2025 stemming from an altercation outside a celebrity kickboxing event in Miami the previous month. According to the warrant, “cell phone video obtained from social media” showed Brown advancing toward the other man with a gun in hand and captured “two shots which occur as Mr. Brown is within several feet” of the alleged victim.
Brown wasn’t arrested until November, when he was apprehended by U.S. Marshals in Dubai. He entered a not guilty plea to the first-degree felony charge of attempted second-degree murder with a firearm.
In December, Brown filed a motion for the case to be dismissed under Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law, which means an individual has no duty to retreat before using deadly force in certain circumstances of self-defense.
Earlier this month, the alleged victim, Zul-Qarnain Kwame Nantambu, released a statement through his attorney saying that he “does not wish to participate” in Brown’s prosecution.
In a statement sent to news organizations on Wednesday morning, Eiglarsh said that despite changing his plea, Brown still maintains that he acted lawfully during the incident.
“Antonio believes in his innocence. He believes strongly in his Stand Your Ground defense, and he believes he would ultimately prevail at trial,” Eiglarsh said. “But when prosecutors put an offer on the table that transforms a potential decades-long prison sentence into a significantly reduced charge and probation, there was simply no way he could reasonably turn it down.”
He added: “Antonio has eight children who depend upon him, and every additional day this case remains unresolved creates extraordinary obstacles for him in securing endorsement opportunities and other business opportunities necessary to support his family. He has spent more than 10½ months living under the cloud of a case with no realistic end in sight. At some point, closure has tremendous value.”