Alleah Taylor, the ex-girlfriend of NFL offensive lineman Chad Wheeler, thought she was going to lose her life during the alleged domestic abuse incident in January.
Taylor offered more details into how Wheeler was acting irratically on the night he is accused of attacking her and leaving her bloodied with a concussion and broken arm.
“In my mind thinking, he’s very emotional. He just had a very hard trip in LA. He just needs to cry it out … get it out of his system. We’ll be on vacay the next morning, the next day. It’ll be OK and it’s a safe space at my house so I just figured that was it,” Taylor told “Daily Blast Live” on Tuesday.
“The moment he wrapped his fingers around my throat that’s when I thought ‘OK, I’m gonna die.’ I didn’t think I was going to make it as soon as he started strangling me,” she said.
Taylor says Wheeler needs to be in prison to fully realize the consequences of his actions.
“He almost took my life and he knows how important I am to so many people in such a brutal way. And then he expected to go on vacay still, which was odd, being in court [and] hearing that he still wanted to go to Hawaii after. I just don’t think that he fully understands the consequences,” she said.
Click on ‘Follow Us’ and get notified of the most viral NFL stories via Google! Follow Us
“This isn’t the first run-in he’s had with the cops in a violent manner,” she added. “I just feel like he needs to understand the consequences of what he did… I just don’t think that him not going [to prison] would be beneficial to him or public safety at all.”
According to CrimeOnline reports: “At one point, the defendant forced his fingers into the victim’s mouth and down her throat, and then crushed his hand down over her nose and mouth, all while continuing to squeeze her throat with his other hand,.”
When the victim tried to roll away, Wheeler “violently grab[bed] her right arm and rip[ped] her body back toward him”, the papers claim.
Taylor lost consciousness and briefly regained it – at which point Wheeler “strangled her back into unconsciousness”, prosecutors alleged.
Wheeler was charged with first-degree domestic violence, domestic violence unlawful imprisonment and resisting arrest. He has pleaded not guilty.
If he is convicted of all the charges against him, he faces a standard sentencing range of roughly nine to 12 years in prison.
