Former NFL receiver Rae Carruth strolled out of a North Carolina prison on Monday morning, ending more than 18 years behind bars for coordinating the murder of his pregnant girlfriend.
Carruth wore a white t-shirt, dark jacket and black knit cap as we emerged from Sampson Correctional Institution in Clinton, North Carolina, about 70 miles south of Raleigh, at 8:02 a.m.
Carruth, 44, didn’t speak to reporters as he walked out of prison on Monday and it wasn’t immediately clear where he was going.
He’ll have to regularly check in with authorities for the next nine months as a condition of his release.
Carruth, a Sacramento, California, native who earned a barber’s certificate while in prison, has previously said he’d like to return to the West Coast.
He was the Panthers first-round draft pick from the University of Colorado in 1997 and played three seasons for the team. And during that third season, Carruth’s girlfriend Cherica Adams was fatally shot four times while she was driving on Nov. 16, 1999.
Rae Carruth of the Carolina Panthers in 1997.Mitchell Layton / Getty Images file
At the time, Adams was eight months pregnant with Carruth’s then-unborn child. Prosecutors said Carruth orchestrated the hit because he wanted to avoid child support.
Doctors saved the life of their child son Chancellor Lee Adams, who was delivered by emergency cesarean section. The 18-year-old, who was deprived of oxygen in the minutes after his mom’s shooting, suffers from permanent brain damage and cerebral palsy.
The young man lives with his maternal grandmother Saundra Adams.
Chancellor Lee Adams with his grandmother Saundra Adams in 2017.Jeff Siner / Charlotte Observer/TNS via Getty Images
The shooter, Van Brett Watkins, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. Watkins, who testified that Carruth paid him $6,000 for the murder, will be in prison until at least 2046.