Source: Bruce Bennett / Getty
UPDATED: 9:00 a.m. ET, June 8
Original story: May 24
Embattled former college basketball star Keith Appling is facing first-degree murder charges stemming from the shooting death of his elderly relative in Detroit last month. The one-time Michigan State University standout has been in and out of trouble with the law since leaving the elite program.
Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy announced on Monday that her office would be formally charging Appling once he’s arraigned at a date that was not determined as of Tuesday morning. The charges Appling will face include one count of first-degree murder, one count of being a felon in possession of a firearm and two counts of felony firearm, the Detroit Free Press reported.
Appling, 29, has been in police custody since May 24 when he was captured during a manhunt following what police described as a family dispute turned deadly.
He is accused of killing Clyde Edmonds, 66, whose wife is Appling’s mother’s first cousin. The two of them allegedly got into a dispute over a gun outside of Edmonds’ home before Appling shot him multiple times on May 22. Appling allegedly dropped the gun on the front lawn and fled in a car before being arrested more than a day later about 57 miles west of Detroit in the town of Chelsea.
Appling’s girlfriend, who was driving the car after the shooting, is also facing charges of one count of accessory after the fact and one count of lying to a police officer for not cooperating during the investigation.
Appling was once a promising basketball prospect from Detroit who won a coveted scholarship to the highly competitive Michigan State team following an outstanding high school basketball career that had him ranked among the nation’s best players.
But since he left college in 2014, Appling has been in and out of trouble, including serving a year in jail in 2017 after pleading guilty to carrying a concealed weapon and resisting and obstructing a Detroit police officer during a traffic stop. Appling was arrested and hit with two other gun charges in 2016.
Most recently, during a separate traffic stop last year, Appling caught a felony drug charge over heroin police found in his car. In that instance, he was sentenced in November to 18 months of probation. However, Appling reportedly violated the terms of his probation, resulting in a warrant for his arrest being issued in February.
Appling has bounced around the world’s basketball leagues, including a brief stint in the NBA and its then-D-League. His jail sentence interrupted Appling’s professional basketball career for two years, but he returned to the game in 2018 with a Dominican team and in the Mexican league.
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