Georgia men's basketball star Humphrey arrested
By CHIP TOWERS
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Published on: 02/07/08
Athens -- Georgia basketball player Billy Humphrey likely will not face suspension from school nor have his probation revoked as a result of his arrest on a misdemeanor charges early Thursday morning, according to his lawyer.
However, athletic association policy dictates that he will likely be suspended for at least three games by the basketball team.
Humphrey, a starting guard for the Bulldogs (11-8, 2-5 SEC), was arrested at 1:23 a.m. Thursday after stepping out in front of an Athens Clarke-County police cruiser while crossing East Broad Street against the light, according to the incident report. After blowing .03 on a field-sobriety test, the 20-year-old was charged with underage possession of alcohol and disobeying a traffic control device. He was booked into Athens-Clarke County Jail at 2:12 a.m. and released on $1,000 bond at 3:45 a.m.
In November, Humphrey was placed on 18 months of probation and entered into a pretrial diversion program as a result of a felony weapons charge for having a butterfly knife in his dorm room. He was also placed on one year's probation by UGA's Office of Judicial Programs for that offense.
But Humphrey's attorney, Kim Stephens, said he is "90 percent confident" Humphrey's probations won't be revoked as a result of this latest incident.
"I hope that something like this wouldn't result in him being terminated from those programs," Stephens said. "That would be a possibility but I'm 90 percent confident they won't."
Kim Ellis, UGA's associate dean of students for judicial programs, agrees. She said she has yet to meet with Humphrey but that he won't likely be suspended from school despite running afoul of the law while on probation.
"If a student on probation is in violation, as the code of conduct says, all previous records can be taken into account," Ellis said. "But there is not a mandated suspension on the table."
Stephens said he has been told UGA will likely extend Humphrey's probation.
However, UGA athletic department policy mandates that a student-athlete that is arrested for an alcohol-related offense be suspended for 10 percent of his team's competition schedule. Since the Bulldogs play 30 games, that would mean a three-game suspension. Georgia plays at Florida on Saturday.
Meanwhile, Georgia coach Dennis Felton was not ready to discuss disciplinary action when asked about Humphrey's status late Thursday morning.
"I'm not going to comment on that now," he said. "I'll be putting out an informative release very, very soon. Once I put out that release I'll be available to comment further."
Felton, considered a no-nonsense disciplinarian, was asked if he thought there was a discipline problem on his team. He dismissed the team's top two players - Takais Brown and Mike Mercer - before the season for repeated athletic department and teams rules violations.
"First of all, it would be inaccurate to paint a picture where my standards are so different from most other coaches out there," Felton said. "We all have standards about being a good student and being a good person. If you read the newspaper every day or click on ESPN.com every day, you'll see that players find their way into trouble from all corners of the country. It's just a reality of college athletics period.
"But, yes, I'm extremely disappointed any time one of our players fails to live up to being a reliable part of our team and our family."
After his felony weapons arrest on Nov. 13, Humphrey was suspended indefinitely from the basketball team. He was entered a pretrial diversion program on the agreement that the charges would be dropped from his record if he stayed out of trouble. He was reinstated to the team a week later after missing one game.
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