A comprehensive compilation of Alabama fan violence over the years

quote:

---

Even a football program as successful as Alabama's has had its share of shocking and embarrassing losses over the decades.

One of those for the Crimson Tide came 30 years ago this fall, when lightly regarded Ole Miss stunned Alabama on homecoming at Bryant-Denny Stadium. The Rebels beat Bill Curry's Crimson Tide 22-12, rallying from a 12-0 third-quarter deficit and scoring two touchdowns in the game's final 46 seconds.

It was a loss that achieved instant infamy in the ensuing hours, when someone -- most likely a disgruntled fan -- threw a brick through Curry's office window at the Alabama football complex.

---

quote:

---

So a 16-7 Crimson Tide win lit a powder keg in the Alabama student section, and eventually, the Legion Field artificial turf. News accounts differed on numbers and video of the postgame wasn’t clear but Alabama students tried to rush the field as the game ended and Birmingham police officers were there to greet them.

“I saw several of them swinging billy clubs,” Alabama student Harold Lambert, then 24, told The Birmingham News. “One cop was swinging back and forth as hard as he could at anybody he could. They were swinging wildly. One of the officers pulled his gun out. He pulled it out and was waving it. They were out of control.”

Approximately 20 people were arrested on the field but a few got away because the 50-60 police officers on-site for crowd control ran out of handcuffs.
“One of the kids with us ran and two police officers went after him and grabbed him as he climbed the fence,” student Brian Shafer told The Birmingham News. “The crowd was hitting the police officers and they were hitting back. The crowd helped him get over the fence. He ran off and got away.”

---

quote:

---

An Alabama football fan has been charged with murder in the death of an Auburn fan. Authorities believe the shooting erupted during a fight over the game between the bitter rivals.

Richard Nicholas, who supported Auburn, was killed by a shotgun blast a few hours after No. 3 Alabama's 21-14 victory Saturday over previously undefeated and now ninth-ranked Tigers, authorities said. Michael Smith, a loyal Crimson Tide fan who is now married to Nicholas' ex-wife, was charged with murder.Authorities said Nicholas was killed by a blast from a 12-gauge shotgun Saturday outside Smith's Mobile home in rural west Alabama.

---

quote:

---

A Pinson man was charged with attempted murder for holding a gun to his son's head and pulling the trigger in the midst of a tantrum after Alabama's double overtime loss to Arkansas Saturday.The bullet narrowly missed 20-year-old Seth Logan, who said he picked the wrong time to ask his dad for a car, sheriff's spokesman Deputy Randy Christian said Monday.

Joseph Alan Logan, 46, surrendered to police Saturday and was charged with attempted murder and domestic violence. He was released from the Jefferson County jail Sunday on $7,500 bond.

According to the police report, Joseph Logan had been drinking alcohol and began slamming doors, tossing boxes and throwing dishes in the sink after the Crimson Tide lost its football game to Arkansas 34-31 in double overtime Saturday.
While Joseph Logan was throwing the tantrum, Seth Logan asked
for a new car.

---

quote:

---

On Nov. 18, 2005, the night before the annual Iron Bowl between Auburn and Alabama, Joey Barrett, Jr., a lifelong Alabama fan and now 25, went to a fraternity party at Auburn and yelled “Roll Tide!” A brawl then broke out, with Barrett stabbing three Auburn students.

One student was hospitalized with a collapsed lung. Two others were also hospitalized while two didn't require medical attention.

Barrett then found a witness, who just happened to be clinically declared as mentally retarded, and offered him a car to admit to being the person who stabbed the brother.

In 2005 he pleaded guilty and served 18 months in jail.

---

quote:

---

Dennis Smith, 41, and Donna Kaye Hall Smith, 39, were shot to death about 7 p.m. Saturday in the rural community of Owassa in southern Alabama, the Conecuh County sheriff's office said. The two divorced about five years ago but had recently gotten back together and were planning to remarry, Odom said.

Michael W. Williams, 28, was charged with two counts of murder in the shooting at his home, where he and others had watched the game. He was being held without bond.

People at Williams' home said the dispute was over the game, which Alabama won 27-21 in overtime, an investigator said. Witnesses said Williams was an Alabama fan and Dennis Smith rooted for LSU, but Odom disputed that, describing Smith as an "adamant Tide fan."

---

quote:

---

Curtis Simms, the Alabama football fan sentenced last week to a 10-year prison term suspended to five years in the 2010 death of a USC fan, will appeal his sentence.
A Richland County jury on Feb. 5 convicted Simms, 27, of breach of peace of a high and aggravated nature, which carries a maximum 10-year sentence.

Simms and the victim, Martin Gasque, 20, who didn’t know each other, had a 30-second chance encounter in traffic outside Williams-Brice Stadium after a USC-Alabama football game. Trial testimony indicated Simms punched Gasque, who then fell under a friend’s pickup truck. The pickup then moved forward, crushing Gasque to death.

---

quote:

---

The Alabama fan who poisoned the iconic Toomer's Corner oak trees at rival Auburn has been sentenced to three years in prison.

Harvey Updyke Jr. pleaded guilty on Friday to criminal damage of an agricultural facility. The sentence requires him to serve at least six months in jail and spend five years on supervised probation for the Class C felony. He has been credited with 104 days already served.

---

quote:

---

Harvey Updyke Jr., the Alabama fan accused of poisoning the oak trees at Auburn’s Toomer’s Corner, said on a Birmingham radio show that he was going to get what he deserves and that he just had “too much ’Bama in me.”

---

quote:

---

The Alabama fan who admitted to placing his privates on a passed-out LSU fan last January learned his sentence this morning. He will get two years in prison.

He’s known to most people as the ‘Bama Teabagger, but his name is Brian Downing and he’s 33 years old.

It was video shot on a cell phone camera that got him into trouble after Alabama beat LSU in the BCS Championship game in the Superdome last January. Downing was videoed in the dining area of Krystal Burger on Bourbon Street exposing his private parts and pressing them against the neck of a passed-out Tigers fan.

---