Washington Redskins safety Montae Nicholson was arrested Tuesday in Loudoun County on charges of assault and battery and public intoxication.
According to the Loudoun County Sheriff’s Office, Nicholson got into a fight with another man and assaulted him. The incident began, according to police, after Nicholson and a woman he was with “pulled up a vehicle and honked the horn” at another couple, escalating to a physical altercation.
Police responded to the report of a fight at the 20040 block of Exchange Street in Ashburn shortly before 2 a.m.
“We are aware of the arrest of Montae Nicholson,” Redskins senior vice president of communications Tony Wylie said in a statement. “We are gathering more information and will not comment until we have further details.”
Sydney A. Maggiore, the woman with Nicholson, was also arrested and charged with malicious wounding and assault and battery. Police say she struck another woman with a bottle and assaulted the male victim.
Both victims went to the hospital for “treatment of serious but non-life-threatening injuries.”
Nicholson, 23, was held at the Loudoun County Adult Detention Center, but was released on a $2,500 secured bond. Maggiore, 24, remains in the center on no bond.
Nicholson was selected in the fourth round of the 2017 draft out of Michigan State. As a rookie, he started six games and had a promising season before landing on injured reserve with a concussion in December. He also missed time with a shoulder injury, appearing in eight games total.
In 2018, Nicholson saw his role diminished once the team traded for safety Ha Ha Clinton-Dix in late October. Over the past four games, the 23-year-old has not recorded a defensive snap and has taken only 26 defensive snaps total since Clinton-Dix’s arrival. Twenty-two of those snaps came Nov. 4 against Atlanta, Clinton-Dix’s first game with the Redskins.
The Redskins have had high praise for Nicholson, with coach Jay Gruden comparing his impact on the defense to that of Jordan Reed’s on the offense. “He can cover so much ground,” Gruden said in the offseason.
Gruden said last week that the team had not soured on the safety.
“Nobody gave up on Montae, we traded for a good player, a Pro-Bowl type player in Ha Ha and we wanted to give him every opportunity to come in and play,” Gruden said. “It wasn’t that we were down on Montae at all, we just needed depth at that position, got him in here and we liked what we saw, so we put him out there early.”
Nicholson has 41 tackles in 14 games this season.
• Matthew Paras can be reached at mparas@washingtontimes.com.
• Adam Zielonka can be reached at azielonka@washingtontimes.com.
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