Texas College student Carlton Champion was arrested Jan. 29. The Tyler Police department arrested him 3 days after 24-year-old Ty Underwood was killed. At that time, it was reported that the young man was a member of the Texas College football team. According to a coach at the institution, Champion is not one of the teams players.
Originally, the Tyler Police Department reported Champion was a member of the team, citing a friend of Underwood’s as its reference. According to an article published in Tyler Morning Telegraph, “It was at that point that investigators connected the dots and confirmed that Champion, in fact, played football for the school.”
According to HBCU Sports, Leonard Smith, football coach at Texas College, debunked the report that mentioned Champion had been a member of the team.
“We provide(d) a roster to the police and showed them that he was not on our team this past fall,” Smith told HBCU Sports. “He (Champion) was trying out this semester just like other kids but he has not played in a game for us.”
Smith provided the roster with hopes of dispelling any faulty information and to avoid the “bad reputation in Tyler” the school seems unable to escape.
Smith said he wanted to correct any misinformation to preserve the schools image that has historically had “a bad reputation in Tyler.”
