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U.S. Football Coach Gets 4-Year Prison Sentence in China

Former Ball State linebacker Wendell Brown has been in prison for nearly two years awaiting the verdict over a bar fight.

A Chinese court has handed down a four-year prison sentence to an American football player who was arrested in the country after a September 2016 bar fight. Former Ball State football player Wendell Brown, who’d moved to China to work as a football coach after a stint with the Canadian Football League, has spent nearly two years in prison for the fight in Chongqing. He has denied any wrongdoing and said he only raised his arms in self-defense after being attacked in the bar. It was not immediately clear if Chinese authorities planned to deport Brown or force him to serve the full term, but his supporters have said the White House is working with Beijing to secure the football player’s release.