University of Tennessee football player Bryce Thompson, 19, was arrested on Saturday for threatening to “slap the sh*t” out of his girlfriend and saying he would “shoot up” the school. He was also indefinitely suspended from the team.
The police say that Thompson, a cornerback for the Volunteers, got into an argument with his girlfriend in Stokely Hall dormitory at around 8 PM on Saturday. The dispute started after the woman found false eyelashes in his room and demanded to know to whom they belonged, according to the Knoxville News Sentinel.
Witnesses told officers that during the argument, Thompson threatened to “slap the sh*t” out of his girlfriend. The witnesses also said that the now-suspended player threatened to “shoot up the school.”
The girlfriend reportedly told police that Thompson “has a bad temper and has punched walls during past arguments.”
The police reported that when they arrived on the scene, Thompson was “extremely agitated.” They also found a metal gate that had been pulled from the wall.
Thompson initially explained that he fell against the gate and then fell down a flight of stairs with it. But later he revised his statement about the gate saying that it broke when he tried to pull it up.
Witnesses added that they heard a loud crashing noise that presumably occurred when the gate was ripped from its moorings.
Thompson was taken into police custody on Saturday night and released on a $3,000 bond on Sunday morning.
The police report that Thompson was charged with domestic assault because he “caused another to reasonably fear imminent bodily injury and the relationship between him and (the woman) is domestic in nature.”
In a statement released Sunday, Volunteers coach Jeremy Pruitt said, “Bryce Thompson is suspended indefinitely while the process continues. We hold our student-athletes to a high standard. The safety of all students is our first priority here at Tennessee.”
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.