{"id":739527,"date":"2026-02-09T05:32:57","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T05:32:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/739527\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T05:32:57","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T05:32:57","slug":"james-pearce-jr-arrest-falcons-defender-facing-five-felony-charges-after-police-chase","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/739527\/","title":{"rendered":"James Pearce Jr. arrest: Falcons defender facing five felony charges after police chase"},"content":{"rendered":"

On Saturday, Atlanta Falcons rookie linebacker James Pearce Jr.<\/a> was arrested<\/a> in Florida after an alleged domestic dispute with\u00a0Los Angeles Sparks\u00a0forward\u00a0Rickea Jackson<\/a>. ESPN\u2019s Marc Raimondi provided further information on Pearce\u2019s charges Sunday.<\/p>\n

\u201cJames Pearce Jr. is facing five felonies, per court records,\u201d Raimondi wrote<\/a> on X. \u201cHe is currently being held in Miami-Dade County on $20,500 bond and assigned to the felony domestic crimes intake unit. Pearce was also given a pre-trial conditional stay-away order with regards to WNBA player Rickea Jackson.\u201d<\/p>\n

Specifically, Pearce was charged with charged with two counts of aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and a count of aggravated stalking. Additionally, he was reportedly charged with fleeing and eluding police officers, aggravated battery of a law enforcement officer and resisting an officer without violence to his person.<\/p>\n

According to Andy Slater<\/a>, Pearce was stalking Rickea Jackson, his ex-girlfriend, with his vehicle. He allegedly attempted to enter Jackson\u2019s vehicle at an intersection, but Jackson sped away from him.<\/p>\n

He allegedly continued to follow Jackson. Pearce reportedly crashed into Jackson to prevent her from reaching the police.<\/p>\n

Slater further reported that Pearce \u201cintentionally\u201d drove into a police officer. Pearce allegedly hit the officer\u2019s knee with his vehicle. Slater said the police officer had his gun drawn and Pearce was refusing commands.<\/p>\n

The Atlanta Falcons selected Pearce with the No. 26 overall pick in the 2025 NFL Draft<\/a>. Pearce made 17 appearances and three starts for the Falcons this past season.<\/p>\n

He recorded 26 tackles, 10 tackles for loss, 10.5 sacks, 16 quarterback hits and a fumble recovery. He received the third most votes for the AP NFL Defensive Rookie of the Year Award.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are aware of an incident involving James Pearce Jr., in Miami,\u201d the Falcons said in a prepared statement. \u201cWe are in the process of gathering more information and will not have any further comment on an open legal matter at this time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before joining the NFL ranks, Pearce played three seasons at Tennessee<\/a>. He made an immediate impact for the Volunteers as a true freshman. In total, Pearce amassed 39 appearances and 12 starts at Tennessee.<\/p>\n

He tallied 71 career tackles, 29.5 tackles for loss, 19.5 sacks and an interception. For his efforts, he was named an All-SEC First-Team selection twice and was a 2024 Lombardi Award semifinalist. In 2025, Pearce signed a 4-year, $16.78 million fully guaranteed rookie contract.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On Saturday, Atlanta Falcons rookie linebacker James Pearce Jr. was arrested in Florida after an alleged domestic dispute…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":739528,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2074],"tags":[223,254,2554,224,7,15383,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-739527","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-atlanta-falcons","8":"tag-atlanta","9":"tag-atlanta-falcons","10":"tag-atlantafalcons","11":"tag-falcons","12":"tag-football","13":"tag-james-pearce-22-julius-l-chambers","14":"tag-nfl"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116039044731306260","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739527","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=739527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/739527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/739528"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=739527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=739527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=739527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}