Arterio Morris arrested and charged with rape, dismissed from KU basketball program

KU basketball guard Arterio Morris was arrested on Friday, according to Douglas County booking logs. According to the logs, he was booked and charged with one count of rape and released on bond of $75,000.

A KU Athletics official told The Star that Morris has been dismissed from the KU basketball team.

“When we learned of allegations regarding Arterio Morris, he was suspended from the Kansas men’s basketball program. We are now aware he has been arrested and charged, and he was dismissed from the program,” KU coach Bill Self said through a news release. “As this is an ongoing legal matter, we are not able to comment further at this time.”

Self, contacted by The Star on Friday, said he had no further comment.

Morris’ first court date is set for 3 p.m. on Oct. 18, the Douglas County Sheriff’s Office confirmed to The Star.

The penalties for the charge — “a severity level 1 person felony,” per court documents — range from a 147 months (12 years, 3 months) to 653 months (54 years, 5 months) in prison and/or a fine of up to $300,000 and 36 months of post-release supervision.

The Star reported on Sept. 15 that Morris had been suspended from the Jayhawks following a rape accusation at McCarthy Hall that was reported to the University of Kansas Police Department in late-August.

The Star obtained the incident report through a Kansas Open Records Act (KORA) request on Sept. 15. Morris was not named in the incident report, but a KU Athletics official told The Star at the time Morris “has been suspended from the program and we have no further comment.” A second source confirmed an allegation had been made against Morris.

Rape reported at the University of Kansas

According to logs from the KU police department, a rape was reported at the 1700 block of Naismith Drive in late-August. The police incident report confirmed the location as McCarthy Hall, which houses the KU men’s basketball players among around 40 male residents and is located just south of Allen Fieldhouse.

Three other KU men’s basketball players were listed on the incident report, two as witnesses and one as “other,” but a source told The Star they were interviewed after the fact and “not involved in the incident at all.” Those players were freshman Johnny Furphy (witness), freshman Elmarko Jackson (witness) and senior transfer Nick Timberlake (other). A witness listing does not necessarily mean a person was present when an alleged crime was committed.

The incident report also listed two other witnesses who were not KU basketball players.

The victim of the alleged rape is an 18-year-old Missouri woman, listed at 5-foot-3, 107 pounds. The alleged incident occurred between 4:30 and 5:30 a.m. on Aug. 26 and was reported at around 9:50 p.m. on Aug. 27, according to the incident report.

KU police department logs indicated on Friday, Sept. 15, that the case had been forwarded to the Douglas County district prosecutor.

In previous conversations with The Star, Morris’ agent Chris Gaston, mentor Juan Rivera, Self and, per a KU athletics spokesperson, KU athletic director Travis Goff declined comment.

Morris has not publicly commented on the allegation. But on Sept. 15, after The Star’s story was published, an X (formerly Twitter) account believed to belong to Morris reportedly shared a screen shot of a post from another user that read: “could never understand how u can be falsely accused . have ur reputation, career family name and everything else tarnished and now it’s all over with no consequences ? nah this ain right man”

The original post was in response to charges against a former Providence college basketball player being dismissed due to “insufficient evidence.”

Morris’ X account has since been deleted.

Arterio Morris’ Texas case

The Jayhawks added Morris to the team ahead of the 2023-24 season despite a different pending legal matter Morris was facing back in Texas. Morris, who was not suspended during his freshman season at the University of Texas (2022-23), received a Class A misdemeanor assault charge from an alleged June 2022 confrontation with an ex-girlfriend in Frisco, Texas.

According to Frisco police, as outlined in an AP story shared on ESPN.com, the woman in that 2022 incident “told police Morris grabbed her arm and pulled her off a bed, then grabbed the front of her sports bra, which she said caused (an) injury on her neck.

“Police reported seeing a 3-inch abrasion on the woman’s neck and arrested Morris on a charge of assault causing injury to a family member, which includes dating relationships in Texas.”

Morris was set to appear for a jury trial on Oct. 2, 2023, but the trial was canceled on Thursday, Sept. 14, when he entered a nolo contendere (no contest) plea to a Class C charge and was ordered to pay a fine of $362.

On June 24 of this year, the alleged victim in that case filed an affidavit of non-prosecution and requested that charges be dismissed. The Denton County District Attorney’s Office had previously told The Star it would continue to pursue charges.

In adding Morris to the Jayhawks, Self previously issued a statement about the court case in Texas.

“We are aware of the charge that Arterio is facing in the State of Texas,” the statement read. “In addition to working with our athletic department and campus administrators, we have also spoken at length with Arterio, his family, his former institution’s University Student Affairs office and his former institution’s Department of Athletics Compliance and Administration.

“Based on these discussions, we are comfortable welcoming Arterio to the University of Kansas and he is well aware of the high standards and expectations that come with being a member of the Kansas Men’s Basketball program. We fully expect him to meet those daily.”

The Star’s Gary Bedore contributed to this report.