For the second time in less than a year, former 49ers linebacker Reuben Foster has had domestic violence charges against him dropped, TMZ Sports reported Thursday.
Foster's attorney Eddie Suarez believed the charges, related to a Nov. 24 incident at the 49ers team hotel in Tampa, Fla., were dropped due to "issues with the witness' credibility," according to TMZ. Foster was to have appeared Thursday morning at an arraignment in Hillsborough County in Florida, but the appearance was canceled after prosecutors dropped the case.
Shortly after Foster and girlfriend Elissa Ennis got into the Nov. 24 altercation, Foster was arrested and released by the 49ers.
It was the second time Foster had been arrested on suspicion of domestic violence. The first incident occurred in their Los Gatos residence in February; Foster was charged with three felonies in that case. Two domestic-violence related charges were dismissed by a judge in May when Ennis recanted the story she had told police. The third, an assault-rifle possession charge, was downgraded to a misdemeanor; Foster pleaded no contest and was sentenced to probation.
"I was very direct with him, that if he didn't prove to us that we could trust how he made decisions it didn't matter whether he was right or wrong," 49ers general manager John Lynch said after the team cut Foster. "That's the consequences of life. If you put yourself in those situations, that's not OK with us."
Ennis since has appeared on "Good Morning America," where she described the incident at the 49ers hotel and also retracted her recantation in the Los Gatos case.
"He called me to come see him in Florida," she said. "And I came and he took one of my phones and he slapped me and pushed me. I told him I was going to tell his new girlfriend that he paid for my flight out there, so that's what triggered it.
"He called me out there so we could work on our relationship. And so I was, 'I can't believe he'd be back to doing this because we both were seeing therapists.' "
Within days of being released by the 49ers, Foster was picked up by Washington. The team was criticized, and said Foster would not suit up for them until the legal process was resolved. Also after the Florida arrest, news surfaced that Foster and Ennis were the subject of a domestic-violence call in Santa Clara in October, but no arrest was made after officers found no evidence of a crime.
