Antonio Brown Pleads Guilty To Reduced Charge In Miami Shooting — Gets Probation, Avoids Prison And A Conviction
Antonio Brown’s Miami court saga ended Friday with a deal that keeps him out of prison. The former NFL star, 38, pleaded guilty in Miami-Dade court to aggravated assault with a firearm — a reduced charge tied to a May 2025 shooting outside a celebrity boxing event in Miami. Judge Marisa Tinkler Mendez sentenced him to three years of probation. Wearing a black leather jacket and white pants, Brown spoke sparingly during the brief hearing, and outside the courtroom he thanked God and said he wanted to “get back to life” and his family.
The sentence is a dramatic step down from where the case began. Brown was originally charged with attempted murder and faced up to 30 years in prison, including a 20-year mandatory minimum. His attorney, Mark Eiglarsh, made clear the plea was not a hard decision. “My client was facing 30 years in prison with a 20-year minimum mandatory, and he was given an offer he just couldn’t refuse,” Eiglarsh said. “Probation was too good to turn down.” He added they were “extremely grateful.”
The charges stem from a night in May 2025 outside a celebrity boxing event in Miami. Police say Brown had been in a fistfight earlier in the evening, then grabbed a handgun from a security staffer and fired two shots at the man he had been fighting. The man, Zul-Qarnain Kwame Nantambu, was grazed in the neck. Nantambu was in court on Friday; he has said publicly that he did not want to press charges, and he has since said he has forgiven Brown.
Prosecutor Howard Rosen told the judge the state sought the reduced charge because there was “a question” of whether Brown was actually attempting to shoot Nantambu, who was walking away from the altercation. Brown maintained he acted in self-defense, saying others tried to attack him and steal his jewelry — a claim that put Florida’s Stand Your Ground law at the center of the case. Rosen said both sides agreed the deal was in everyone’s best interest, in part so Brown receives therapeutic treatment.
The plea closes a case that followed Brown across the world. An arrest warrant on the attempted murder charge was issued in June 2025, and Brown was extradited in November 2025 from Dubai, where he has business interests, to face the charge in Miami.
Under the deal, Brown’s probation conditions include weekly counseling sessions and a ban on possessing a firearm. If he follows the conditions, he can ask the court to end his probation around the halfway point — roughly 18 months in. Just as significant for Brown: the plea lets him avoid not only prison time, but a criminal conviction on his record.
Source: Associated Press. Photo: Carl Juste/Miami Herald via AP, Pool.
