The Buffalo Tickets released rookie punter Matt Araiza two days after being accused in a civil trial of raping a 17-year-old girlthe team announced on Saturday.
“The last 48 hours have been very tough, for a lot of people. It’s been very tough,” Bills general manager Brandon Beane said at a press conference Saturday. “We sympathize with this whole situation, all parties involved. This young woman, what she’s been through. You feel really bad for this whole situation. At the end of the day, it’s a legal situation – we don’t know all the facts. That’s what makes it difficult.
“But right now we just think it’s the best decision for everyone to leave Matt and let him deal with this situation and focus on that, so we’re going to part ways there.”
The Bills retained Araiza in the team’s final preseason game against the Carolina Panthers on Friday.
Head coach Sean McDermott said that he had been informed of the accusation, but did not give details of when the team learned of it or whether the bettor had lied when they spoke to him.
The civil lawsuit filed Thursday in San Diego County Superior Court alleges that Araiza, then 21 and a member of the San Diego State football team, had sex with a 17-year-old high school student. years intoxicated outside an off-campus party in October 2021 before bringing her to a room where she was allegedly assaulted by multiple men for nearly 90 minutes.
COURT CASE: Buffalo Bills rookie Matt Araiza accused of participating in the gang rape of a minor
“We tried to be thorough and thoughtful and not rush to judgment, and I would say that’s not easy. You try to put facts around a legal situation sometimes with limited information,” said said Beane. “There are a lot of things we couldn’t get our hands on. It was about letting Matt deal with his situation. It’s more important than football.”
Lawyer:Bills never spoke to the woman who accused Matt Araiza of rape
Araiza was selected by Buffalo in the sixth round of the 2022 NFL Draft in late April after playing at San Diego State. He was a first-team All-American and won the Ray Guy Award as the best bettor in the nation.
“Matt is very disappointed that his career with the Bills ended not because he played poorly, but because of false allegations made against him by a young woman and her attorney,” Araiza’s attorney wrote. , Kerry Armstrong, in a statement to USA TODAY Sports. “I hope he’s back in the NFL soon. He deserves it, because he’s the hardest-working twenty-two-year-old player I know.”
Dan Gilleon, the teen’s attorney, slammed Armstrong in a statement released to USA TODAY Sports after Araiza’s release.
“Mr. Araiza’s legal counsel had the audacity to go on a vile, brainless TV tour to defame my client as a ‘shakedown’ artist and ‘money hoarder’. Think about it,” Gilleon wrote. . “Mr. Araiza’s legal agent knew that a 17-year-old girl had left a room where Matt Araiza was also present, covered in blood and bruises and crying that she had been raped. is bent over so low that he was ready to label it A 17-year-old girl, an opportunistic con artist. It was totally inhumane and incredibly stupid.
“If Matt Araiza had shown 1% of my client’s grace, perhaps by apologizing and donating his money to a charity serving rape victims, he would still be a Buffalo Bill and his parents could s Instead, he decided to hire a lawyer who only knew how to violently go after the young woman his client had raped.
“Now Mr. Araiza’s life is also scarred forever. Perhaps this is the justice he deserves.”
According to the lawsuit, the teenager drank with friends before attending a Halloween party on the night of October 16-17 at an off-campus house where Araiza lived. She said Araiza, who was 21 at the time, gave her a drink which she said “contained not just alcohol but other intoxicants” although she said that she was in high school, the suit adds.
The lawsuit says Araiza took the inebriated teen to the side of the house and told her to give him oral sex before he “pulled her off the floor, turned her around to face the party and” enters from behind. Then Araiza allegedly took her to a room where her teammates took turns raping her for an hour and a half. The teenager said she lost consciousness during the sexual assault, the complaint states.
Zavier Leonard and Nowlin “Pa’a” Ewaliko were also named in the lawsuit. Both are no longer listed on the San Diego State football roster.
Contributor: Jace Evans
