Vols dismiss two frosh charged in armed robbery

Published Nov. 17, 2009 9:27 p.m. ET

foxsports

Two of three Tennessee freshmen football players charged last week in an attempted armed robbery have been dismissed from the team.

"Clearly, their actions have no place in our program," coach Lane Kiffin said Monday.

Kiffin said wide receiver Nu'Keese Richardson, 18, and defensive back Mike Edwards, 18, were permanently dismissed from the team, while former starting safety Janzen Jackson, 18, will continue to be barred from team activities while Kiffin awaits more information in his case.

Richardson was the player whose recruitment first got Kiffin in trouble with the Southeastern Conference. Kiffin joked in February that Florida coach Urban Meyer cheated in trying to keep Richardson as a Gator, earning Kiffin a reprimand from the SEC.

All three players were out on bond but kept home Saturday when Tennessee traveled to play Mississippi.

Three victims told police they were sitting in their parked vehicle about 2 a.m. last Thursday outside a convenience store near Tennessee's campus when two males dressed in hooded jackets, one brandishing a handgun, approached and demanded, "Give us everything you've got."

"The victims stated that they all presented their wallets to the suspects and showed them that they did not have money," a police report said. "The victims stated that a third black male then approached and told the other two black males, 'We've got to go."'

The three freshmen were arrested shortly afterward with companion Marie Montmarquet, 22, also a UT student. She allegedly drove their getaway Toyota Prius in which police found a pellet gun and hooded jackets.