Falcons' Pearce in Pretrial Intervention

0:00It's April 23rd. This is NFL News Today, AI-powered stories from around the league. I'm Corey with the story. Atlanta Falcons' Edge-Rusher James Pierce Jr. just agreed to a pretrial intervention program to clear three felony charges from a domestic dispute. Back on February 7th, with his ex-girlfriend, WNBA star Ricca Jackson. It's a six-month diversion deal, and if he finishes clean, all felony and misdemeanor counts get dropped. The charges include aggravated battery, with a deadly weapon, fleeing and eluding police, plus resisting an officer with violence, along with A, misdemeanor stalking count. One other battery charge against an officer was already dismissed. Police say it started when Jackson tried driving away toward a station for help, but Pierce collided his SUV into her car, then sped off and clipped. An officer's knee, Pierce had a breakout rookie year after the Falcons took him 26 overall in last year's draft, leading the team with 10 and a half sacks, and setting a franchise record with 45 quarterback

1:05pressures. But these charges put his spot on the roster in Limbo, and new coach Kevin Stofansky confirmed he skipped the start of voluntary offseason workouts. General manager Ian Cunningham said, everything status quo with no updates as of Monday. The deal broke first on Atlanta's WSB TV, right as this year's NFL draft kicked off. Pierce and his lawyers are all about him getting back on track, linking up with the team, and bawling out on and off the field, so we'll see how this plays out for the Falcons pass rush.