James Cooter
The Detroit Free Press hasa curious story about the Detroit Lions' new offensive coordinator, who was arrested twice in Tennessee in the past 10 years.
Police records have a booking photo, but no details about the arrests, Robert Allen of the Freep writes:
James "Jim Bob" Cooter, now 31, was arrested and charged with aggravated burglary in 2009 and with drunken-driving in 2006, according to previous reports from the Associated Press and The Tennessean. In June 27, 2009, a woman said he climbed through an apartment window, stripped down to his underwear and got into bed with her, the AP reported July 2, 2009. Knoxville police spokesman Darrell DeBusk said at the time that there was no indication Cooter knew the woman.
But on Friday, DeBusk said there is no arrest record for Cooter.
"What I may have said with regard to an incident years ago does not mean that I can confirm that record again," he told the Free Press. "There's no record. There's nothing."
Lions spokesman Bill Keenest wrote in an e-mail to the Freep that the charges were dropped.
The Knox County Sheriff's Office, which had the booking photo, had nothing else on Cooter.
"I'm actually not showing a criminal history on him. My guess is that it's been expunged," sheriff's office spokeswoman Hillary Martin wrote in an email to the Free Press.
His bio on the team site says:
Jim Bob Cooter joined the Lions offensive coaching staff as the team’s quarterbacks coach last season after serving as an offensive assistant with the Denver Broncos in 2013. Entering his seventh season as an NFL coach, Cooter came to Detroit after helping guide the Broncos offense en route to a berth in Super Bowl XLVIII in 2013.
