This list features famous athletes who have been convicted of homicide or related crimes, whether it be murder, involuntary manslaughter, negligent homicide, or conspiracy to commit murder. Both professional and amateur athletes have been included, although amateurs on this list must have competed in the Olympics or some other equal level of competition.
Who are some sports stars convicted of murder? Bertil Fox and Craig MacTavish are just two notable individuals in the sports world who are on this list. While Fox was, in fact, convicted of murder, MacTavish's charge was manslaughter.
If there are any athletes convicted of murder missing here, please feel free to let us know in the comments. For whatever reason, jocks have a knack for getting themselves into trouble with the law – but these homicidal athletes are the most extreme cases.
Famous Athletes Convicted of Homicide,
Bruce Kimball
In the 1980s, diver Bruce Kimball was known for his silver medal-winning performance at the 1984 Summer Olympics after returning from a devastating car crash with a drunk driver that left him severely injured. The Comeback Kid, as he was called, however, was known for being the drunk driver in a second tragic accident. In 1988, two weeks before the U.S. Olympic Diving Trials, Kimball killed two boys and injured four more after driving his car into a crowd of teenagers. Kimball, who was drunk at the time, was sentenced to vehicular manslaughter, sentenced to 17 years in prison, and served five. Today, he serves as a high school teacher and coach for the swimming and diving teams.
Charles Smith
Retired NBA player Charles Smith had a notable basketball career at Georgetown University, with the 1988 United States Men's Olympic Basketball Team and in the pros with the Boston Celtics and Minnesota Timberwolves. His promising career, however, was interrupted in 1991 when he was involved in hit-and-run incident that killed two students on the campus of Boston University. Smith was convicted of vehicular homicide, sentenced to four-and-a-half years in prison, and served 28 months. More recently, in 2010, Smith was shot in Maryland. The incident prompted police to search his home, during which they found cocaine and evidence of a gambling operation.
Clifford Etienne
Clifford "The Black Rhino" Etienne enjoyed a successful boxing career in which he had 29 wins in 35 fights. Interestingly enough, he began boxing while serving a prison sentence for armed robbery. After earning numerous awards for his post-prison boxing career, Etienne found himself back behind bars in 2006 on charges of armed robbery, kidnapping, and the attempted murder of a police officer during a crazy cocaine-fueled bender that involved robbing a business, carjacking, and kidnapping a family and trying to shoot two cops. He was swiftly sent back to prison for 150 years without the chance of parole.
Craig MacTavish
Craig MacTavish has been many things during his long hockey career, including a 19-year veteran in the NHL, a Stanley Cup winner with the New York Rangers, a coach for the Edmonton Oilers, and unfortunately, also someone convicted of vehicular homicide. MacT, as he's known, served prison time in the early 1980s after he killed a 26-year-old woman during an alcohol-induced car crash. The NHL was forgiving of his fault, and he returned to the league soon after his prison release.
Darryl Henley
Once a promising football player with the UCLA Bruins and the Los Angeles Rams, Darryl Henley found himself in a heap of legal trouble starting in 1995. Henley was convicted of drug trafficking and sentenced to 20 years in prison. He apparently was not too pleased with that verdict, as he allegedly hired a hitman to take out the judge and a key witness on the case. That earned him another 21 years to his sentence.
Donté Stallworth
National Football League wide receiver Donte Stallworth had a notable football career with the Tennessee Volunteers and several teams in the NFL before he earned a season-long suspension for off-the-field troubles. In the early morning hours of March 14, 2009, Stallworth was driving a Bentley coupe in Miami Beach, Florida, when he hit and killed a pedestrian. Though he'd slept since last drinking, he was still legally drunk at the time of the accident, which led to DUI and second degree manslaughter charges. He served 30 days in jail, performed 1,000 hours of community service, and paid a financial settlement to the victim's family. He returned to the NFL for the 2010 season.
Dwayne Goodrich
Cornerback Dwayne Goodrich went from earning the Defensive MVP honors in the NCAA Football National Championship Game with the Tennessee Volunteers in 1998 to serving eight years in prison for criminally negligent homicide. Goodrich, who also played in the NFL for the Dallas Cowboys, was involved in a hit-and-run accident in 2003 that killed two people. He was fined $20,000 and sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison, a term that was later extended by five years. He was released in October 2011 after serving eight years.
Dale Crowe
Former boxer Dale Crowe is currently serving a 20-year prison sentence for involuntary manslaughter, aggravated robbery, and engaging in corrupt acts. Crowe was arrested in Ohio in 2006 after skeletal remains of 23-year-old Frank Banam were found in a trash bin. In 2002, Banam and Crowe allegedly got into an argument, which ended with Crowe beating and strangling Banam. Crowe, who spends his days in the Warren Correctional Institution in Lebanon, Ohio, has a scheduled release date for 2026.
Bertil Fox
Former bodybuilder Bertil Fox was imprisoned in 1998 after he was convicted of the murder of his former fiancee, Leyonca Browne, and her mother, Violet Browne. Both were shot to death on September 30, 1997, on the island of St. Kitts. Initially, Fox was tried and a hung jury allowed him to go free. Public outrage, however, led to a retrial, where Fox was convicted and sentenced to the death penalty. Later, the sentence was deemed unconstitutional, and Fox has been in a St. Kitts prison ever sense.
Ben Kramer
Superboat racer Ben Kramer was already in prison for conspiring to import and distribute marijuana, drug smuggling, andfederal money laundering when he was convicted of the 1987 murder of speedboat designer and builder Donald Aronow. Kramer bought Aronow's USA Racing Team, but was forced to sell it back to him after the Customs Service would not do business with him. Despite taking a plea deal, which included a life sentence, in 1996, Kramer later sought for that plea to be dismissed, claiming that hitman Robert Young confessed to the crime prior to his death.