Photo credit: @barstoolsports

By: Ana Kieu

San Francisco 49ers linebacker Reuben Foster has been charged with three felonies, but he’s still with the team. The former 2016 Butkus Award winner was drafted 31st overall by the 49ers at the 2017 NFL Draft. He was previously a consensus High School All-American and often regarded as the No. 1 inside linebacker prospect of that class.

Those charges of domestic violence include inflicting great bodily harm, forcefully attempting to prevent a victim from reporting a crime, possession of an assault weapon, respectively. Foster appeared in court Thursday. His bail remains at $75,000. He was ordered to have no contact with the victim, which is his live-in girlfriend. Also, a plea hearing was set for April 30. If convicted, he could face more than 11 years in prison.

The allegations against Foster are horrific. Yeah, the obvious disclaimer is that a defendant is innocent until proven guilty, but there’s virtually nothing that could compel a judge to let him be a free man…unless if that judge doesn’t know what they’re doing. There should be no excuse to defend a male who has ruptured a female’s eardrum nor should there be another excuse when it comes to punching a woman in the head eight to 10 times. Even if there were such excuses for malicious behavior, the 49ers would escape from trouble, but head coach Kyle Shanahan would basically contradict what he said at his introductory press conference on February 9, 2017, at Levi’s Stadium.

I was in attendance for the conference and I can remember a part of Shanahan’s opening statement.

Shanahan said: “There’s really two things that are important to me and that’s my family and that’s football and that’s really all the things I think about. As sad as that is, it’s true. That’s all you guys will get from me. You don’t always make the right decisions, but I can promise you guys we’re going to do everything we can to do that. We’re going to hold people accountable. We’re going to do it the right way. Everybody who’s in this from the top to the bottom will be going in one direction. What does it take to win now and what does it take to consistently win over the long haul. We will be committed to that 100 percent.”

Apparently, the words “accountable” and “responsible” were just corporate buzz words used by the 49ers coaching staff. Now, I know there are other things that the team needs to work on, but repeating those words isn’t going to help anyone. It’s a shame that Foster has the world in his hands, but is seemingly throwing it all away. I hope the victim will recover and the defendant will get all 11 years of that possible sentence.