Here is a look at the life of Aaron Hernandez, former New England Patriots tight end. He was convicted in 2015 of the murder of semi-pro football player Odin Lloyd and was sentenced to life in prison.
Personal:
Birth date: November 6, 1989
Death date: April 19, 2017
Birth place: Bristol, Connecticut
Birth name: Aaron Michael Hernandez
Father: Dennis Hernandez, a high school custodian
Mother: Terri (Valentine) Hernandez, a school secretary
Children: with Shayanna Jenkins: Avielle Janelle Hernandez, November 6, 2012
Education: Attended University of Florida, 2007-2009
Other Facts:
Odin Lloyd, 27, played semi-pro football for the Boston Bandits and dated the sister of Shayanna Jenkins, Hernandez’s fiancée.
Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado were immigrants from Cape Verde who worked as cleaners.
Hernandez was very close to his father, Dennis, who died in 2006 due to an infection during surgery for a hernia.
Timeline:
2009 - Hernandez becomes the first Florida Gator to win the John Mackey Award, awarded every year to the top collegiate tight end.
January 2010 - Announces his decision to skip his senior year at Florida and turn pro.
April 24, 2010 - Hernandez is picked in the fourth round of the NFL draft by the New England Patriots.
April 27, 2010 - Due to allegations of multiple failed drug tests, Hernandez makes a statement admitting one failed drug test while playing for Florida.
August 27, 2012 - Signs a five-year contract extension with the New England Patriots, worth up to $40 million.
June 17, 2013 - Prosecutors say Odin Lloyd is seen at around 2:30 am leaving with Hernandez and Hernandez’s friends, Carlos Ortiz and Ernest Wallace, in a rented silver Nissan Altima.
June 17, 2013 - A jogger finds a body riddled with gun shot wounds at an industrial park in North Attleboro, Massachusetts.
June 18, 2013 - Police search Hernandez’s home in connection to the body found in the industrial park a mile away, which is later identified as Lloyd.
June 22, 2013 - Police search Hernandez’s home for the second time.
June 26, 2013 - Hernandez is arrested and charged with first-degree murder for Lloyd’s death. He is also charged on five weapons-related charges. He pleads not guilty and is held without bail. Hernandez is released by the New England Patriots less than two hours after his arrest.
August 1, 2013 - Tanya Singleton, Hernandez’s cousin, is jailed for not testifying before the grand jury. Prosecutors say that Wallace and Ortiz were at Singleton’s home the night Lloyd was murdered.
September 19, 2013 - Wallace pleads not guilty to the charge of an accessory after the fact of a slaying.
September 27, 2013 - Ortiz s indicted on a single count of accessory to murder after the fact, in connection with the Lloyd’s death. He later pleads not guilty.
October 16, 2013 - Jenkins, Hernandez’s fiancee, pleads not guilty to perjury charges. Prosecutors allege that she lied to a grand jury and disposed evidence.
November 27, 2013 - Hernandez’s attorney files an answer to a complaint in federal court in Miami filed by Alexander Bradley, stating that Hernandez is invoking his Fifth Amendment rights. Bradley claims Hernandez shot him in the face after an argument in a Miami strip club.
December 16, 2013 - Lloyd’s family files a wrongful death lawsuit against Hernandez.
January 16, 2014 - Unsealed court documents reveal that prosecutors suggested that Hernandez may have pulled the trigger in an unsolved Boston double homicide in July 2012. Victims Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado were killed when shots were fired into their 2003 BMW. Another passenger was wounded and two others were uninjured.
January 30, 2014 - The Bristol County District Attorney’s Office alleges Hernandez used “coded messages” in jailhouse calls to discuss allegations that he killed Lloyd. Prosecutors request recordings of jailhouse calls and records of Hernandez’s visitors since his arrest in June 2013.
February 7, 2014 - The judge denies the prosecution’s request for the recordings of Hernandez’s jailhouse phone calls.
February 25, 2014 - According to the Bristol County Sheriff’s Department, Hernandez is involved in an “altercation with another inmate.”
February 26, 2014 - The families of De Abreu and Furtado, the two men gunned down in Boston in 2012, file a wrongful death lawsuit against Hernandez; each family is seeking six million dollars.
April 11, 2014 - The two friends who were seen in the car with Hernandez on June 17, 2013, Ortiz and Wallace, are indicted and charged with Lloyd’s murder.
May 1, 2014 - Hernandez is indicted on charges of assault and battery and threatening to do bodily harm, in connection to the February 25 jailhouse altercation. He is also indicted for threats to do bodily harm in connection with a November incident in which he allegedly threatened someone who worked at the jail.
May 15, 2014 - Hernandez is indicted for the July 2012 murders of de Abreu and Furtado and charged with two counts of first-degree murder, three counts of armed assault with attempt to murder and and one count of assault and battery by means of a dangerous weapon.
May 28, 2014 - At his arraignment, Hernandez pleads not guilty. Prosecutors allege that Hernandez killed de Abreu and Furtado after de Abreu bumped into Hernandez at a nightclub, causing the latter to spill his drink.
July 7, 2014 - A defense request to have Hernandez moved to a jail closer to Boston is granted. His lawyers argue that the trip from their offices to the Bristol House of Corrections could take up to two hours due to traffic.
July 8, 2014 - A judge in the civil lawsuit brought by the families of de Abreu and Furtad freezes Hernandez’s $5 million in assets pending the outcome of his double-murder trial. This includes the disputed $3.3 million Hernandez claims he is owed by the New England Patriots.
August 12, 2014 - Singleton, Hernandez’s cousin, pleads guilty to contempt of court for refusing to testify before the grand jury. She is sentenced to two years probation and one year home confinement. She receives home confinement because she has cancer.
September 23, 2014 - Singleton is sentenced to two years of home confinement after pleading guilty to contempt of court. She was sentenced for a similar offense last month.
January 26, 2015 - The jury is selected.
January 29, 2015 - Opening statements by prosecution and defense in Fall River, Massachusetts. Prosecution team: William McCauley, Patrick Bomberg, Roger Michel, and Brian Griffin. Defense team: Michael Fee, James Sultan, and Charles Rankin.
February 10, 2015 - The trial judge releases a decision granting immunity to Jenkins, Hernandez’s fiancee.
February 11, 2015 - A second juror is dismissed from the trial. The jury is now made up of 10 women and six men.
April 15, 2015 - Hernandez is found guilty of first-degree murder in Lloyd’s death, and is sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. He is also convicted of unlawful possession of a firearm and unlawful possession of ammunition, and his sentences are two and a half years to three years, and six months to three years, respectively.
May 11, 2015 - Hernandez is indicted in Massachusetts for witness intimidation in the 2013 shooting of Bradley. Prosecutors believe Bradley to be a witness to the homicides of de Abreu and Furtado, and say Bradley was shot by Hernandez after he made a remark about the double murder.
May 19, 2015 - Hernandez is disciplined for allegedly agreeing to be the lookout for an inmate who went into another prisoner’s cell at Souza-Baranowski Correctional Center, a law enforcement source with knowledge of the incident tells CNN.
May 21, 2015 - Hernandez pleads not guilty to witness intimidation in the Bradley shooting case.
December 3, 2015 - According to media reports, Hernandez is found with a homemade knife or a shank in his prison cell, and is moved to a separate part of the prison.
February 12, 2016 - Hernandez settles a lawsuit filed by Bradley, who said the football player shot him after a fight at a bar. The terms of the settlement are not released to the public.
May 12, 2016 - Wallace is acquitted of murder but convicted on charges of accessory to murder after the fact in Lloyd’s shooting death in 2013. Wallace is sentenced to a 4½ to 7 year prison term.
April 14, 2017 - Is found not guilty of murder in the deaths of Furtado and de Abreu outside a nightclub in July 2012. Of the eight counts Hernandez faced, he is found guilty of just one: illegal possession of a firearm.
April 19, 2017 - Hernandez is found hanged in his prison cell at 3:05 am. He is pronounced dead at 4:07 am of an apparent suicide, according to the Massachusetts Department of Correction.
April 20, 2017 - Hernandez’s family announces they plan to donate his brain to scientists to determine whether he had chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the degenerative brain disease linked to a number of NFL athletes. The brain will be released to the Boston University CTE Center for further examination, according to the Worcester County District Attorney’s Office.
May 9, 2017 - A Massachusetts judge vacates Hernandez’s murder conviction. Hernandez’s defense attorneys had asked the court to follow the legal rule called “abatement ab initio,” or abatement, in which convictions are thrown out if a defendant dies before their appeals are heard.
September 21, 2017 - Attorney Jose Baez tells reporters that results from tests performed on Hernandez’s brain showed a “severe case” of CTE. Baez also announces a federal lawsuit filed, on behalf of Hernandez’s daughter, against both the NFL and the New England Patriots.
October 13, 2018 - The Boston Globe’s Spotlight Team releases a six-part series on Hernandez. “Gladiator: Aaron Hernandez and Football Inc.,” is based on scores of interviews, thousands of court and government records, and recordings of nearly 30 jailhouse phone calls between Hernandez and others, the Globe writes. Along with the editorial series, the Spotlight Team also released its first multi-episode podcast as a companion to the story.
March 13, 2019 - Hernandez’s murder conviction is reinstated after the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court unanimously found that legal rule of abatement should be abolished.