It’s been quite a summer for former Los Alamitos High School football player Shaquille Richardson, And this is only early August. Yesterday Richardson started his college football career at The University of Arizona, but that’s not where the summer started out for the star cornerback. He spoke to OC180NEWS by phone from Arizona Tuesday night.

In June, Richardson began his college career with summer school at UCLA, a scholarship, and Pac-10 football dreams dancing in his head. But, just a few days into it, he was arrested along with two teammates on charges of felony theft. UCLA didn’t wait for the outcome of the charges and quickly kicked Richardson and the other two players off the team and out of the school.

At the time, UCLA issued a statement which said “The three young men know they made a terrible mistake," head football coach Rick Neuheisel said in a statement. "We expect our players to behave a certain way and there are consequences when they don’t."

UCLA indicated the three players could reapply for winter quarter, but that would mean missing this upcoming football season. The next event in this tale came about a month later, on July 20, 2010, when the Los Angeles District Attorney decided not to prosecute the three players. “We thought there was insufficient evidence to support felony charges,” Jane Robison, Press Secretary for the LADA’s Office, told OC180NEWS. “So, we referred it to the City Attorney’s Office for misdemeanor consideration.” That’s where it still stands – under review with no filing decision made as of yesterday.

When the DA decided to drop the felony charges, we wondered if UCLA would reconsider their decision to kick the players out, but their answer was a resounding no – see our related article below.

We asked Richardson, given the DA’s decision, if UCLA acted prematurely. “I understand the position we put Coach Neuheisel in,” Richardson said. “The position he was in – he couldn’t not do something – he didn’t really have a choice but to come down hard.”

That was the fumble. But, Richardson – nimble on the gridiron – moved quickly to recover possession of his budding career. Rather than waiting for another chance at UCLA, he decided to move to the University of Arizona. He started practice there yesterday.
One spokesperson for the Arizona Athletics Department yesterday told OC180NEWS “We did not know anything about him coming until he showed up in the equipment room two days ago.”

We asked Richardson about what happened at UCLA. He told us “Bad choices made, but I’m trying to move on from it.”

With regard to his recommendations for young people – “They have to see themselves and stay away from bad situations – keep an eye on everything.”

Was he conned into this situation? “No not at all, I’m just as responsible as anybody else that was in that situation with me - I don’t place the blame on anyone.”

So, one football player gets a second chance - we wished Richardson a great season and said good night.