Yahoo Sports 
Jury begins deliberations in Thabo Sefolosha-NYPD trial
The trial involving veteran NBA wing Thabo Sefolosha and the New York Police Department moved on to the jury deliberation phase Thursday. The day's proceedings included testimony from the 30-year-old defendant and his Atlanta Hawks head coach Mike Budenholzer and saw closing arguments from both the defense and prosecution.
Sefolosha is seeking a full dismissal of three misdemeanor charges that arose from the April 8 incident outside a New York nightclub that culminated in an aggressive takedown and a broken leg that ended his season prior to the NBA postseason. The Swiss national rejected a conditional dismissal in favor of clearing his name in relation to events that he and ex-teammate Pero Antic say were not their fault.
[Yahoo Fantasy Basketball: Sign up for a league today]
Defense attorney Alex Spiro has argued that police officers profiled Sefolosha as "a black man in a hoodie" before applying an undue amount of force. Both Sefolosha and Antic, who received a full dismissal in September, testified Wednesday that, as requested, they had vacated the crime scene surrounding the stabbing of fellow NBA player Chris Copeland and two women in an unrelated incident on the same night, although not without exchanging unfriendly words with an NYPD officer. The former teammates said that officers accosted Sefolosha as he attempted to give money to a beggar. Police testimony claims that Sefolosha lunged at them to provoke their response.
Thursday's testimony and argument focused on these issues. From Jake Pearson of the Associated Press:
''They arrested him,'' Sefolosha's attorney, Alex Spiro, said in his closing argument. ''They broke his leg out of eye shot or ear shot of an unrelated crime scene.''
Before the confrontation turned physical, the 6-foot-6 Sefolosha said he challenged the tone of a particularly aggressive officer who was ushering him, former teammate Pero Antic and others along, calling the 5-foot-7 officer ''a midget.'' Charges against Antic later were dropped.
But prosecutors presented a different theory of the case, arguing Sefolosha, a Swiss citizen, acted entitled as he slowly departed the club as he was ordered to move, eventually locking his arms in front of him to make it more difficult for arresting officers to put on handcuffs.
''The police don't get to tell the defendant how to play basketball,'' an assistant district attorney, Francesca Bartolomey, said in her summation. ''The defendant doesn't get to say where the crime scene ends.''
Prosecutors on Thursday also called back two officers who said they didn't see defense witness Amos Canty, the panhandler, near where Sefolosha was arrested, a contradiction of Canty's earlier testimony.
And the Manhattan Criminal Court judge instructed jurors they could infer that one or more police officers' statements to police officials weren't consistent with their testimony after internal police documents surfaced indicating Antic was far more aggressive than cellphone video showed him to be.
Reigning NBA Coach of the Year Mike Budenholzer also appeared Thursday to serve as a character witness for Sefolosha. From an earlier version of Pearson's article:
Taking the stand as the final defence witness in Sefolosha's trial, Budenholzer described the Atlanta Hawks guard-forward as "highly intelligent" and a "hard worker." [...]
"Thabo is of the highest character," he said during brief testimony in Manhattan Criminal Court.
Lindsey Adler of BuzzFeed tweeted that jurors deliberated for roughly 20 minutes before finishing for the day.
Thursday's events follow Wednesday's announcement that two NYPD officers will face an administrative trial related to an excessive use of force in tackling retired tennis star James Blake, who was mistaken for an identity theft suspect in September. Yet these incidents involving athletes are merely symptomatic of greater concerns regarding the NYPD's treatment of minorities, particularly in regards to the choking death of Staten Island resident Eric Garner and the department's use of "stop-and-frisk" tactics.
Sefolosha has been cleared to play and will rejoin the Hawks at the completion of the trial. Atlanta opened its preseason schedule with a 98-96 win against the Cleveland Cavaliers in Cincinnati on Wednesday night.
- - - - - - -
Eric Freeman is a writer for Ball Don't Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at efreeman_ysports@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
