A former William and Mary football player accused of embezzling about $4,800 from the Nike Factory Outlet at the Premium Outlets will face a grand jury.
William Bradley Thompson, who played for the Tribe in 2011, is alleged to have both given massive discounts and free items to three of his friends — Evan McGill, Raphael Ortiz and Mikal Abdul-Saboor — who are all current members of the Tribe, according to a criminal complaint filed in Williamsburg-James City County District Court.
The offenses are alleged to have happened between November 2012 and June 2013. McGill, Ortiz and Abdul-Saboor have not had any charges filed against them.
At a Tuesday hearing in Williamsburg-James City County District Court, a conspiracy to commit embezzlement charge against Thompson was dropped. A lone felony embezzlement charge remains against him.
Williamsburg-James City County Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Joshua DeFord argued before substitute judge Thomas Murphy that the conspiracy charge should have been kept because of a written statement Thompson gave to a Nike loss prevention employee that said he gave discounts to his friends. He also referenced security footage he said showed Thompson and another person at a cash register moving down to another register when a manager appeared nearby.
Murphy sided with Thompson’s lawyer, Joshua Goff, saying those two items did not amount to enough evidence for him to certify the conspiracy charge.
Goff sought to have the embezzlement charge dropped. He said there wasn’t any evidence that Thompson directly benefited from the alleged embezzlement. Murphy, however, did certify the embezzlement charge, sending the matter to circuit court.
