Brother of NFL Player Janoris Jenkins Charged With Manslaughter

Janoris Jenkins’ older brother, William, has reportedly been charged with manslaughter in connection to the body found in Jenkins’ basement on Tuesday.

Jenkins, cornerback for the New York Giants, has been in Florida for several weeks, ever since his team’s training camp ended. While he was away, the body of 25-year-old Roosevelt Rene, a family friend, was discovered in Jenkins’ home in Fair Lawn, New Jersey.

Now, William is facing a charge of aggravated assault over the corpse. Police told TMZ that they have multiple leads connecting William to Rene’s body, despite his earlier alibi.

William was arrested in upstate New York — 300 miles from Fair Lawn — about nine hours before Rene’s body was discovered. The arrest was due to an unrelated parole warrant violation, but it placed William definitively in another place at the point in time when house workers came across Rene. However, police have come to believe that William may have killed Rene before he left for New York, perhaps explaining some of his other erratic behavior since then.

William was reportedly planning to fly down to Florida and visit his younger brother on Monday night. According to ESPN reporter Dianna Russini, he caused an uproar on the plane, suddenly deciding he was too afraid to fly before getting off the aircraft.

At the same time, Jenkins himself was planning to return to New Jersey at last on Tuesday, after several weeks away. When word reached him that a body had been found in his home, he reluctantly decided to stay in Florida for a while. Russini said that his lawyers advised him to do so, as Jenkins had reportedly let family members use his Fair Lawn home while he was away.

Representatives of the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office spoke to TMZ as well, noting that the charges against William were “merely accusations. Defendant presumed innocent.” They also noted that the investigation is continuing, despite the arrest.

The charges could put William in jail for between ten and 30 years, if he is convicted. The 34-year-old was brought in for questioning on Tuesday afternoon, though investigators seemed to give him the benefit of the doubt. He was referred to only as a “person of interest” at the time.

Still, on Twitter, Jenkins’ fans felt vindicated by his brother’s arrest. The cornerback has been the subject of lots of controversy in his career, but fans were still displeased to see Jenkins immediately becoming a suspect in the court of public opinion. The fact that he chose to stay in Florida did not help his standing either.