*This is not the kind of story that will bring to mind that oldie but goodie by Shep and the Limelites called “Daddy’s Home.” Nope, we’re talking about the release former NFL player Rae Carruth, who was released from prison earlier today after serving 18 years for ordering the slaying of his pregnant girlfriend.
“I’m excited about just being out of here,” he told Charlotte’s WSOC-TV by phone a few days before his release from the Sampson Correctional Institution in North Carolina. “I’m nervous just about how I’ll be received by the public. I still have to work. I still have to live. I have to exist out there and it just seems like there is so much hate and negativity toward me.”
Carruth, a former first-round draft pick for the Carolina Panthers completed his sentence of 18 to 24 years, however he did not speak to reporters as he left the prison.
Carruth, now 44, was found guilty of orchestrating a plot to kill Cherica Adams to avoid paying child support. Adams was shot four times on Nov. 16, 1999 while driving her car in Charlotte, but managed to make a 911 call that pointed the finger at the NFL player.
Adams, eight months pregnant, died less than a month after the shooting. The child she was carrying was delivered (a boy who was named Chancellor), but suffers from permanent brain damage and cerebral palsy.
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Carruth has said he wants to have a relationship with Chancellor, who remains in the custody of his grandmother, Saundra Adams, had said she would be there when Carruth got out of prison, but she was not present on Monday.
Carruth, a wide-receiver, was drafted by the Panthers in 1997. Then Panthers center Frank Garcia said players were stunned when they heard the news of about his possible involvement in the murder.
“It would be like finding out the guy sitting in the cubicle next to you at work was arrested for murder,” Garcia said. “You just don’t always know people as well as you think you do.”
Some players testified at the trial, and others would spend time in the players’ lounge watching it on Court TV.
“That is one time where you were actually hiding from the cameras,” Garcia said. “You just wanted to stay low and not be involved. All along you’re asking yourself, ‘Did I miss any signs? How is somebody capable of this?’”
Carruth worked as a barber while behind bars, making about $1 per hour, according to North Carolina Department of Public Safety spokesman Jerry Higgins. He had signed a $3.7 million contract with the Panthers after being drafted.
Carruth also told WBTV (Charlotte, NC) in a recent interview he’s “excited” to get out of prison but nervous about how he’ll be received by the public, acknowledging there is “so much hate and negativity toward me.”
Hmmm, we wonder why. Maybe it’s the … cone head?
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