KEY WEST, Fla. – Cleveland Browns defensive end Lonnie Phelps is facing a drunken driving charge in South Florida after police said he slammed an SUV into a Key West restaurant Wednesday night.
Phelps, of Cincinnati, was booked into the Monroe County jail just after 9:45 p.m. Wednesday, according to online records.
The 23-year-old was signed by the Browns as an undrafted free agent in 2023 after playing college football for Ohio’s Miami University and the University of Kansas; he has been on the team’s practice squad and hasn’t yet appeared in a regular-season game.
The Browns released him following his arrest, Cleveland ABC affiliate WEWS reports.
According to the Key West Police Department, Phelps drove into the Red Shoe Island Bistro at 411 Petronia St. just before 9 p.m. He had a woman with him in the Hyundai Tucson at the time, authorities said.
A post on the KWPD Facebook page states the “building and the vehicle were significantly damaged, but there were no injuries.”
A photo shared in the post shows a large hole in the side of the eatery. Red Shoe Island Bistro posted a video showing the aftermath to its own Facebook page.
“No one was hurt by the car that drove into our restaurant tonight. Thankfully, we were closed,” the post reads. “It could’ve been really bad…Angels were looking out for us all.”
According to an arrest report, both Phelps and the woman he was with appeared to be intoxicated. Witnesses said the two got into an argument after the crash, police wrote.
KWPD Officer Andrea Bernatova wrote in the report that Phelps was “very agitated” and had “glassy, watery, blood-shot eyes, droopy eyelids, and a strong odor of alcohol coming from his breath.”
She said the NFL player “kept throwing his hands in the air and rushing us to ‘do what we have to do’” and, at one point, “turned around, placing his hands behind his back without any direction to do so.”
Police said he was uncooperative as they questioned him about the crash.
“When I asked Phelps if he could tell us how the crash happened, he said it happened and asked what does he have to pay for. I asked Phelps where he was driving from and he said ‘right in front of it,’” Bernatova wrote. “I re-asked the questions four times in a different way and Phelps always answered, “right in front of it”. Phelps also asked me what did he crash into.”
He later told an officer “he wants to pay for whatever damages he needs to pay for and be done with it” and “kept rambling about his credit card,” police said.
During an attempt to get Phelps to complete field sobriety tests, he told the officer she “was tripping,” at one point telling the officer, “Just put the tape down so I can walk the line like a concussion test,” the report states.
During that test, Phelps claimed he “cannot count” and eventually “performed a casual stroll next to the line not even resembling what I instructed him to do,” Bernatova wrote.
The uncooperative football player was later placed under arrest.
“Phelps talked about how thirsty he was, how he did not know what I was going to do to him because females are the worst, asked me not to kill him, asked me how long it takes to bail out, how long I was a detective, and informed me I was Russian,” Bernatova wrote.
During a breathalyzer test, Phelps asked to go to the bathroom, police said.
Bernatova wrote that she told him he could use the bathroom after the diagnostic was complete but he insisted he had to “go now.”
“Phelps said, ‘I’m peeing, bro,’ and he did,” she wrote.
Bernatova said Phelps, after urinating himself, declined to provide a breath sample.
Phelps remained in the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office Key West jail facility as of around noon Thursday, online records show.
He’s facing a misdemeanor charge of driving under the influence causing property damage.
“We are aware of the incident, gathering more information and have no further comment at this time,” the spokesperson told the station.