In a New York City domestic abuse case, former Houston Rockets guard Kevin Porter Jr. has entered into a plea agreement that will keep him out of jail as long as he follows through on a court-mandated treatment program and remains out of trouble.
Porter, 23, entered a guilty plea to charges of misdemeanor assault and harassment concerning an event that occurred at a Manhattan hotel in September of last year.
Porter allegedly attacked his girlfriend, cutting a severe gash above her right eye and leaving her covered in blood, according to the prosecution. Since then, she has disputed it and charged that the prosecution is putting out a “false narrative.”
Porter is required by the agreement to finish a private counselor-led program that is similar to the 26-week Abusive Partner Intervention Program. He must also abide by a restricted order of protection, attend all court dates and have no future arrests.
Prosecutors stated that Porter would be able to expunge his assault plea after a year and complete his time for the non-criminal harassment charge, thereby cleaning his criminal record.
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Porter’s attorneys, Phillip Jobe and Stephanie Kelemen released a statement saying, “The resolution will allow Mr. Porter to put this incident, which involved false felony allegations and false facts, behind him with no criminal record and move forward.”
Porter is no longer on an NBA roster and has not played since his arrest. In October, the Oklahoma City Thunder acquired him from the Rockets, and they cut him right away.
Porter was taken into custody on September 11 when his girlfriend, Kysre Gondrezick, a former WNBA star, allegedly informed police that he had hit her in the face multiple times with a closed fist, leaving her with bruises, cuts, and severe facial agony.
Police said that Kysre Gondrezick also said that Kevin Porter Jr had put his hands around her neck and strangled her, causing breathing problems, redness, bruising on her neck, and loss of mobility in her left arm.
That story was refuted by Kysre Gondrezick, who stated that her injuries “don’t support any of those claims.” Prosecutors, she claimed, were sluggish to amend “false information,” citing Porter’s since-retracted first allegations that he had broken one of her neck vertebrae.
In October, she also revealed to the New York Post that she and Kevin had a fight in their room at the Millennium Hilton, which is close to the UN, “for not even 10 seconds.” When Porter returned to the hotel after a night out, she was startled awake and fell, sustaining injuries to her head, she told TMZ in November.
According to a tweet she posted on X, Porter and Gondrezick began dating in February 2022. She claimed to TMZ that the way the case was handled by the Manhattan district attorney’s office “compounded my trauma even more than the actual experience.”
Kevin Porter Jr signed a lucrative four-year agreement with Houston after averaging 19.2 points, 5.3 rebounds, and 5.7 assists per game the previous season.
Porter was arrested in November 2020 while he was a player for the Cleveland Cavaliers. The police claimed to have discovered drugs and a loaded weapon in Porter’s car following a single-vehicle collision. The charges were later dropped after Porter maintained that he was unaware of the presence of the pistol.