NBA Draft Prospect Terrence Shannon Jr. Found Not Guilty of Rape, Sexual Battery | News, Scores, Highlights, Stats, and Rumors

Former Illinois basketball player and current NBA draft prospect Terrence Shannon Jr. was found not guilty of rape and not guilty of aggravated sexual battery on Thursday, per Matt Norlander of CBS Sports and Danny Connolly and Amanda Brennan of WCIA.

A jury in Kansas cleared him of any criminal wrongdoing with the ruling.

Connolly and Brennan previously reported on the case and noted Shannon was initially charged in December when a then 18-year-old woman “accused him of digitally penetrating her at a bar called the Jayhawk Café in September.”

She performed a sexual assault examination kit, although there was not enough DNA evidence to match to anyone.

Illinois suspended him from the basketball team as a result of the allegations, although he returned for the club’s Jan. 21 game against Rutgers after U.S. District Court Judge Colleen Lawless ruled the school violated his civil rights with the punishment and issued a preliminary injunction that allowed him to play.

WAND reported on the trial, noting it started with jury selection Monday, included multiple days of witness testimonies and came to an end with Thursday’s closing arguments and a ruling.

Shannon, who pleaded not guilty, was among those who took the stand and said that while he went to the Jayhawk Café on the night in question, he had never interacted with the alleged victim and saw her for the first time during last month’s preliminary hearing.

He also said he had approximately four drinks and two shots that night, which he said was not enough to forget the events of the evening.

As part of his testimony, Shannon pointed to the lawsuit he previously won that allowed him to keep playing for the Illinois basketball team. However, prosecutors argued that it was not a criminal trial and had different standards than these proceedings.

Shannon played the rest of the season for Illinois following the injunction and helped lead it to the Elite Eight, where it lost to eventual national champion UConn.

He is now preparing for the NBA draft. Bleacher Report’s Jonathan Wasserman projected Shannon as the No. 33 pick in his latest mock draft.