Sacramento Kings basketball player Ron Artest, who was involved
in one of the most notorious brawls in US sports history in 2004,
was arrested on Monday on domestic violence charges, officials
said.
Local police arrested Artest, 27, at his residence in Loomis,
California, a suburb of the state capital Sacramento, on Monday
morning and released him on $50,000 bail by 2 p.m. Citing privacy
laws, officials declined to say whether the victim was his
wife.
"Artest was booked on the charge of domestic violence and
preventing a victim from reporting a crime, so two charges," said
Dena Erwin, a spokeswoman for the Placer County Sheriff's
office.
Geoff Petrie, the Kings' president of basketball operations,
said in a statement the NBA team "have excused Ron Artest
indefinitely from any further participation with the team."
The Kings would seek facts about the case "over the next several
days before taking any further action," he said.
Artest, then playing for the Indiana Pacers, lost about $5
million in earnings after a 73-game suspension when a 2004 fight
spilled into the stands.
Officials set an arraignment date of March 22.
(China Daily via Agencies March 7, 2007)