{"id":21936,"date":"2026-07-30T10:51:47","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T05:51:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=21936"},"modified":"2026-07-30T10:51:47","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T05:51:47","slug":"ex-lsu-football-players-mother-says-son-needs-treatment-not-jail-after-arrest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=21936","title":{"rendered":"Ex-LSU football player\u2019s mother says son needs treatment, not jail after arrest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div id=\"\">\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">MIAMI BEACH, Fla. \u2014 Sharon Byrd still lights up at the mention of her son\u2019s name.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">\u201cHe has his Heisman trophies right here,\u201d Byrd said. \u201cSo this is a young man that had a future and once that accident happened, everything went away.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.local10.com\/news\/local\/2026\/07\/28\/who-wants-to-die-today-man-pulls-knife-on-fellow-bus-rider-who-told-him-to-shut-up-cops-say\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"\" title=\"https:\/\/www.local10.com\/news\/local\/2026\/07\/28\/who-wants-to-die-today-man-pulls-knife-on-fellow-bus-rider-who-told-him-to-shut-up-cops-say\/\">Demetrius Byrd<\/a>, once a standout football player at Miami Central who helped lead LSU to a national championship in 2005, is now in jail, accused of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Byrd\u2019s mother blames a head injury from a car crash, just before he was set to be drafted into the NFL, for triggering mental illness.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">\u201cEverybody is against him, everybody wants to hurt my son, in his mind,\u201d Byrd said. \u201cEveryone wants to hurt him.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Byrd, 40, appeared before a judge Tuesday to answer to the charge.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">\u201cHe had a silver multi-tool in his right pocket,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Police said it was on Monday when the 40-year-old was on a Miami-Dade Transit bus in Miami Beach, causing a disruption near Abbot Avenue and Island Creek Drive.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">They said a male passenger tried to calm Byrd down, but that only escalated the confrontation.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">\u201cHe opened his multi-tool to a blade and asked the victim if he wanted to die and walked towards him with a blade in his hand,\u201d the judge said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">The bus driver called police, which led to Byrd\u2019s arrest.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">\u201cMy son don\u2019t need jail, he needs help mentally,\u201d Byrd\u2019s mother said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">Despite her plea for help, Byrd\u2019s mother said she is not giving up on her son.<\/p>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph\">\u201cThere\u2019s nothing vicious about him and anyone who knows him will tell you that. That\u2019s not my son,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<div class=\"b-article-body__html\">\n<div class=\"l10-neighborhood\" role=\"complementary\" aria-label=\"News From Your Neighborhood\">\n<p>\ud83c\udfe0 News From Your Neighborhood<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"c-paragraph b-article-body__copyright\">Copyright 2026 by WPLG Local10.com &#8211; All rights reserved.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script>\n            window.fbAsyncInit = function() {\n              FB.init({\n                appId: '1469427621501520',\n                cookie: true,\n                xfbml: false,\n                version: 'v21.0'\n              });\n            };\n            (function(d, s, id){\n              var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0];\n              if (d.getElementById(id)) return;\n              js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id;\n              js.src = \"https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/sdk.js\";\n              js.defer = true;\n              fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);\n            }(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));\n          <\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MIAMI BEACH, Fla. \u2014 Sharon Byrd still lights up at the mention of her son\u2019s name. \u201cHe has his Heisman trophies right here,\u201d Byrd said. \u201cSo this is a young man that had a future and once that accident happened, everything went away.\u201d Demetrius Byrd, once a standout football player at Miami Central who helped&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21937,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/wplginc-wplg-prod.web.arc-cdn.net\/resizer\/v2\/https%3A%2F%2Fd2p7h58ldpiqzj.cloudfront.net%2F07-29-2026%2Ft_d219875086704d2391bbbc174cf6fb2d_name_47463756799_hdtv.jpg?auth=1a08e1f8673a974133fbd0e35f19d99eefa0cad47f49a65ab149b16275ab9284&width=700","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-real-trending-viral-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=21936"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21936\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/21937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=21936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=21936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=21936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}