Antonio Brown Pleads Guilty to Reduced Charge, Avoids Jail in 2025 Shooting Outside Miami Boxing Event

Former NFL wide receiver Antonio Brown will not go to prison for the May 2025 shooting outside a celebrity boxing event in Miami. On Friday, Nov. 6, he pleaded guilty in Miami-Dade circuit court to aggravated assault with a firearm, a reduced charge, and was sentenced to three years of probation. Prosecutors had originally charged him with attempted second-degree murder, and his lawyer said that charge carried a 20-year minimum mandatory sentence.

Circuit Judge Marisa Tinkler Mendez accepted the deal, according to The Associated Press, as reported by CBS News Miami. Under the agreement Brown, 38, avoids a criminal conviction as well as prison time. The resolution ends a case that began with an arrest warrant in June 2025, wound through Brown's arrest in Dubai and extradition to South Florida, and kept the former Tampa Bay Buccaneers receiver under house arrest with a GPS ankle monitor for nearly a year.

What the plea deal requires

Brown's sentence is three years of probation. Reports from the hearing describe several conditions attached to it:

• Weekly counseling sessions, according to the AP.
• A ban on possessing firearms, according to the AP.
• No contact with the man who was shot at, according to NBC 6 South Florida.
• A psychological evaluation, with treatment if it is found necessary, according to NBC 6.

The AP reported that other conditions apply that were not detailed in court coverage. Both the AP and NBC 6 reported that the plea lets Brown avoid a criminal conviction. In Florida, that outcome generally means the judge withholds adjudication: the defendant serves the sentence, but the court does not formally record a conviction.

Brown spoke briefly outside the courthouse. According to the AP, he thanked God and said he wanted to "get back to life" and spend time with his family.

Why prosecutors agreed to a lesser charge

NBC 6 reported that the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office reduced the charge because the man at the center of the case did not want to cooperate with prosecutors, and because prosecutors could not prove the shooting was intentional.

That man, identified in court records and news reports as Zul-Qarnain Kwame Nantambu, told investigators that one of the bullets grazed his neck. His attorney, Richard Cooper, said earlier this fall that Nantambu had forgiven Brown and would not cooperate with law enforcement, according to the AP. NBC 6 reported that Nantambu again said he forgave Brown and wanted the case closed.

Brown's attorney, Mark Eiglarsh, framed the deal as one his client could not pass up. "My client was facing 30 years in prison with a 20-year minimum mandatory, and he was given an offer he just couldn't refuse," Eiglarsh said, according to the AP. He told NBC 6, "We're extremely grateful that this is finally behind us."

Reports have cited different maximum penalties for the original charge. At the time of Brown's November 2025 bond hearing, WSVN reported that the attempted murder charge carried up to 15 years in prison and a fine of up to $10,000. In September 2026, the AP reported that Brown could have faced up to 30 years in prison if convicted as charged, the same figure Eiglarsh cited on Friday.

What happened outside the boxing event

The charges stem from the night of May 16, 2025. Brown attended an underground boxing event in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood hosted by streamer Adin Ross, WSVN reported. According to the arrest warrant, Brown got into a fistfight with a man after the event, then grabbed a handgun from a security staffer and fired two shots at him.

Brown has maintained that he acted in self-defense. He said on social media that he was being attacked and that others were trying to steal his jewelry, the AP reported. His defense was framed against Florida's Stand Your Ground law, which allows a person who reasonably fears death or great bodily harm to use deadly force without a duty to retreat.

Brown was briefly detained after the incident, NBC 6 has reported. A Miami-Dade circuit court issued the warrant charging him with attempted murder in June 2025.

From Dubai to a Miami courtroom

Brown was arrested in Dubai on Oct. 2, 2025, according to WSVN, and was extradited to the United States in November 2025. Brown has business interests in Dubai, and his lawyer rejected any suggestion that he had fled. "He didn't flee to Dubai; he has business in Dubai," Eiglarsh said at the bond hearing, as reported by WSVN.

After his return, Circuit Judge Mindy S. Glazer allowed Brown to post a $25,000 bond. She ordered him to wear a GPS ankle monitor, stay under house arrest at his Broward County home while the case was pending, and stay away from the man who was shot at. Brown walked out of the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center in West Miami-Dade after posting bond, WSVN reported. He pleaded not guilty to the attempted murder charge at that stage.

A deal that took more than a month to finish

The plea agreement was not a surprise. Brown was expected to accept a deal at a hearing on Sept. 30, 2026, when Eiglarsh said his client was ready to plead no contest to aggravated assault in exchange for probation, the AP reported. Judge Tinkler Mendez postponed that hearing because she was in the middle of another trial and was not ready to proceed, and reset it for Oct. 28.

Eiglarsh called the September delay a setback. "It's a setback because it's another month that my client has an ankle monitor on," he said, according to the AP, adding that he was "cautiously optimistic" the judge would approve the terms. The plea was ultimately entered on Nov. 6, and reports from the hearing describe it as a guilty plea to aggravated assault with a firearm rather than the no contest plea discussed in September.

Brown's NFL career and Florida ties

Brown played 12 NFL seasons and was an All-Pro wide receiver, spending most of his career with the Pittsburgh Steelers. He finished with 928 receptions, more than 12,000 receiving yards and 88 total touchdowns, including scores on punt returns and one on a pass, according to the AP.

His Florida chapter is the one many fans remember best. Brown won a Super Bowl with quarterback Tom Brady and the Buccaneers in Tampa Bay, where he last played in 2021. His NFL career effectively ended during a game that season against the New York Jets, when he removed his jersey, shoulder pads and gloves and left the field. The Buccaneers released him afterward.

Brown's legal troubles predate the Miami case. The AP has reported that he faced a battery charge involving a moving truck driver, several domestic violence charges and a failure to pay child support, among other incidents.

What's next

Brown now begins three years of supervised probation. If he completes it and meets every condition, including counseling, the evaluation and the firearm ban, the case should close without a conviction on his record. A violation of probation could send the case back before Judge Tinkler Mendez, who would have the authority to impose a harsher sentence.

For Brown, the deal closes a case that kept him on house arrest and GPS monitoring as a condition of his pretrial release since November 2025, a restriction his lawyer cited as a burden while the plea was delayed. For Miami-Dade prosecutors, it resolves a high-profile shooting case in which the man who was shot at had made clear he would not help them take it to trial.