David Meggett charged with rape, denied bond

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COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Several months after he was charged with raping a South Carolina woman, former NFL running back David Meggett was in jail Wednesday on allegations of another sexual assault.

Meggett, 42, was arrested and charged with raping a 21-year-old woman in her North Charleston home, authorities said.

The woman told police she woke up at 1 a.m. Tuesday and found a man she knew as "Mike" sitting on her bed, according to an incident report. The man demanded that she repay $200 she owed him and raped her when she said she didn't have the money, police said.

Afterward, the man told her he was sorry and that she didn't have to repay him. The woman drove herself to the hospital, where Meggett later met her and was arrested, according to police records.

Meggett, who is listed as living in North Charleston, had been out on bond in connection with another sexual assault charge.

In September, he was charged with third-degree criminal sexual conduct after a 17-year-old North Charleston woman told authorities she was raped by a man she knew as "Michael," according to police records.

Both South Carolina arrests occurred while Meggett was serving out two years' probation for a 2006 sexual battery charge in North Carolina. Authorities there allowed the Charleston native to serve his sentence in South Carolina and have been notified about both of Meggett's recent arrests, said Pete O'Boyle, spokesman for the South Carolina Department of Probation, Parole and Pardon Services.

North Carolina probation officials did not immediately return a phone message Wednesday.

The running back played for the New York Giants, the New York Jets and New England during his 10-year NFL career.

He was denied bond Tuesday night on charges of first-degree criminal sexual conduct and first-degree burglary, said Spencer Pryor, spokesman for the North Charleston police. He was being held Wednesday in the Charleston County jail, and it was unclear if he had an attorney.

Meggett has been acquitted on sex-related charges in the past. In 1990, while he was with the Giants, Meggett was found not guilty of soliciting sex from an undercover police officer in Baltimore. Eight years later, he was charged with assaulting a woman in a Toronto hotel room after she refused to continue having sex with him, but that charge was dropped.

The Patriots released Meggett in 1998 after the Toronto charge.

Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press