Aaron Hernandez asserted his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination on Wednesday in formally responding to a civil suit where a former friend claims the one-time NFL star shot him in the face, according to the Boston Globe.
In a suit filed last June that is seeking $100,000, Alexander Bradley, 31, claims the jailed former New England Patriot shot him and then abandoned him as the two left a Miami strip club in February.
"Defendant asserts his rights under the Fifth Amendment and, therefore, declines to respond to the allegations," The Globe reports the filing states 13 times in response to specific allegations contained in Bradley's civil complaint.
According to police reports, Bradley initially told investigators he didn't know who shot him after being discovered discarded along the road by workers from a nearby John Deere tractor store. Police soon closed their investigation after he refused to cooperate with authorities.
Several months later, Bradley fingered Hernandez as his attacker in his suit, alleging the two quarreled while driving back toward Palm Beach and Hernandez pointed a gun at him and fired " either intentionally or through extreme negligence," causing him to lose his right eye and be subjected to multiple surgeries.
Attorneys for Hernandez has previously sought to have the case delayed until a ruling in the first-degree murder charge he faces stemming from the shooting death of Odin Lloyd earlier this year. Lloyd's bullet-riddled body was found less than a mile from Hernandez's North Attleborough mansion and police have theorized he may have allegedly shot Lloyd because he could incriminate him in other crimes.
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