Commanders Cut Ties With Kicker Brandon McManus After Sexual Assault Allegations

The Wash­ing­ton Com­man­ders have part­ed ways with kick­er Bran­don McManus fol­low­ing alle­ga­tions of sex­u­al assault made against him in a recent lawsuit.

Accord­ing to the law­suit filed in Duval Coun­ty, Flori­da, two flight atten­dants accused McManus of inap­pro­pri­ate behav­ior dur­ing a Sep­tem­ber 2023 flight on a pri­vate plane for the Jack­sonville Jaguars, with whom he was play­ing at the time. 

The women, iden­ti­fied as Jane Doe I and Jane Doe II, alleged that McManus groped them and tried to kiss one of them with­out consent.

McManus’ attor­ney called the claims “absolute­ly fic­ti­tious and demon­stra­bly false,” but the Com­man­ders released the for­mer Super Bowl cham­pi­on on Sunday. 

The team stat­ed it “takes alle­ga­tions of this nature very seri­ous­ly” but did not pro­vide an offi­cial rea­son for cut­ting McManus.

In a state­ment, McManus’ lawyer expressed dis­ap­point­ment with the team’s deci­sion, say­ing they planned to “aggres­sive­ly defend and clear Bran­don’s name and rep­u­ta­tion through the legal process.”

The 32-year-old kick­er had just signed a one-year, $3.6 mil­lion con­tract with the Com­man­ders in March 2024 after nine sea­sons with the Den­ver Broncos.

The team’s swift action to release him fol­low­ing the sex­u­al assault alle­ga­tions under­scores the grav­i­ty with which they viewed the claims.