Former NFL player Kellen Winslow Jr. has pleaded guilty to raping an unconscious teenager back in 2003 and to sexual battery involving a 54-year-old hitchhiker.
The guilty plea means that Winslow Jr. aces up to 18 years in prison instead of a life sentence.
Kellen, 36, was found guilty of the May 2018 rape of a 58-year-old homeless woman he befriended in Encinitas. According to reports, he was also convicted of indecent exposure and lewd conduct for incidents involving two other women.
One of the women claims that Kellen raped her at a San Diego house party back in 2003 when she was just 17. He was 19 at the time of the alleged rape.
“Each of these victims, they didn’t try to come out here in order to try to frame Mr. Winslow,” prosecutor Dan Owens said outside of the courtroom per ESPN.”
The fact that they had that courage to come forward and speak with law enforcement and to testify to all the things that he had done while facing all these cameras, I think it was important to me to make sure that that truth was heard, and it was important to me to make sure that he was held accountable for each one of those crimes.”
Defense attorney Marc Carlos said shared why Winslow copped a plea:
“The downside of any conviction would land him in prison for the rest of his life, and he made this decision based upon his family, his father, his children, and he wanted to be there for them in the future,” Carlos said.