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WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Tuesday considers the latest dispute that pits religious rights against LGBTQ rights as the justices weigh parents’ objections over books made available in a school district’s elementary schools that feature stories about gay and transgender characters.

At issue are books included in the English language arts curriculum in Montgomery County, Maryland. The dispute arose in 2022 after the school board in Montgomery County, a large and diverse jurisdiction just outside Washington, decided it wanted more storybooks reflecting LGBTQ stories to better reflect the people who live there.

One book, “Uncle Bobby’s Wedding,” features a gay character who is getting married. Another, called “Born Ready,” is about a transgender child who wants to identify as a boy.

Some parents objected on religious grounds under the Constitution’s First Amendment, saying their children should be able to opt out of any exposure to the content.

The lead plaintiffs are Tamer Mahmoud and Enas Barakat — a Muslim couple who have a son in elementary school. Other plaintiffs are members of the Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox churches.

They are not challenging the curriculum itself, just the lack of an opt-out.

A federal judge and the Richmond, Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals both ruled in favor of the school board.

The Supreme Court will determine whether the school board policy burdens religious rights. The justices could then determine whether that burden violates the Constitution, or they could send the case back to lower courts to make that determination.

The parents, represented by the religious liberties group Becket, say that under Supreme Court precedent they have a right to opt out of any instruction that would interfere with their children’s religious development.

The school board is “compelling instruction designed to indoctrinate petitioners’ children against their religious beliefs,” the parents’ lawyers wrote.

The parents have the backing of the Trump administration.

Lawyers for the school board said in court papers that there is no attempt to coerce children and that there was an attempt to allow an opt-out “until doing so became unworkably disruptive.”

The lawyers wrote that the court record is “devoid of evidence that petitioners or their children are compelled or pressured to modify their religious beliefs or practice.”

The school board also asserts that although the books are in classrooms and available for children to pick up, teachers are not required to use them in class.

The Supreme Court has a 6-3 conservative majority that often backs religious rights, including in cases involving conflicting arguments made by LGBTQ rights advocates. In 2023, for example, the court ruled in favor of a Christian web designer who refused to work on same-sex weddings.

The court is hearing another major religious case next week when it considers whether to approve the country’s first public religious charter school.

In its next term, which starts in October, the court will consider a challenge to state laws that ban “conversion therapy” aimed at young people questioning their sexual orientations or gender identities.

Texas A&M defensive end Shemar Stewart is 6-foot-5 and 267 pounds. He ran the 40-yard dash at the NFL combine in February in 4.59 seconds to go along with a 40-inch vertical jump and a 10-foot, 11-inch broad jump.

But he also had just 4.5 sacks in 37 career games for the Aggies.

It’s a glaring stat to consider when a major part of a defensive end’s job is to get to the quarterback — Penn State edge Abdul Carter, a consensus top-five pick, had 12 sacks last year alone.

And it’s why NFL Network’s Daniel Jeremiah calls Stewart, a projected first-round pick in Thursday’s draft, “easily the most polarizing edge rusher.”

“He is the ultimate example of traits versus production,” Jeremiah said on a conference call this week. “He has got all kinds of twitch, he’s explosive, he’s disruptive. He just hasn’t been able to finish, to compile sacks.”

NFL front offices must decide in the coming days whether Stewart’s elite physical attributes are worth more than his questionable sack total. After all, selecting prospects is more than just looking back at college production. It’s about how a player could turn out long term under a professional coaching staff.

“It opens the door for a really interesting conversation about a guy that disrupts plays but doesn’t finish plays and has the size and athleticism that you want at the NFL level,” NBC Sports draft analyst Connor Rogers said. “How high do coaches and evaluators value that?”

Picking a high-ceiling, low-floor prospect is nothing new. There have been many players who dominated in the NFL combine — showing out in categories like the vertical jump, the broad jump, the bench press and 40-yard dash — without the college stats to back it all up. Some NFL evaluators pass on those types of guys, thinking the risk is not worth the reward, especially in the first round.

Others, though, are willing to take that chance.  

A prime example is defensive end Odafe Oweh. At 6-foot-5 and 255 pounds, he was the prototypical edge rusher coming out of Penn State. Ahead of the draft, he blew scouts away with a 4.39 40-yard dash and an 11-foot-2 broad jump. They also did a double-take when they saw his seven sacks over three seasons, including zero in his final year as a Nittany Lion. 

The Baltimore Ravens bet big on traits over production and have been heavily rewarded. 

Oweh, who has since transitioned to linebacker, has 23 sacks in four years. Last year, he posted 10, the second-most on the team, and he has been a key disruptor for one of the NFL’s best defenses. 

Travon Walker is another success story. The defensive end had 9.5 sacks over three seasons at Georgia but was selected No. 1 overall by the Jacksonville Jaguars in 2022 for his high upside. He has now posted back-to-back double-digit sack totals. 

But for every Oweh and Walker, there are players like former LSU linebacker K’Lavon Chaisson who don’t work out. Chaisson was a national champion and first-team All-SEC player, but he didn’t fill up the stat sheet in college. The Jaguars took him in the first round in 2020, and he has 10 sacks over five NFL seasons and is now on his fourth team in five seasons. 

NBC Sports’ Chris Simms envisions Stewart in the former category, not the latter. Despite the lack of production at Texas A&M, he calls Stewart “one of the safest picks in the draft.” 

“You’re not going to have to worry about him being physically overmatched,” Simms said on his podcast, “Chris Simms Unbuttoned.” “The ceiling has a chance to be one of the greatest players in the history of football — that’s the talent and physical makeup the guy has.”

Rogers said: “You don’t have to be a genius to tell that he’s got just a freakish build — size, length, athleticism. You’re not supposed to move like that with that kind of body.”

Stewart’s elite measurables allows him to routinely beat offensive lineman into the backfield. And while he may not get every sack or tackle behind the line of scrimmage, he’s constantly affecting the play. Quarterbacks are forced to quickly adjust with him inching closer. Running backs need to change the direction of their rushes. 

Simms has a phrase for that. 

“One of our favorite stats is ‘f— the play up.’ I believe disruption is production,” he said. “There are too many plays where this guy makes freaky plays, ruins it, and somebody else gets the tackle or the sack.”

But Stewart’s inconsistent finishing ability shouldn’t entirely be overlooked. According to Pro Football Focus, he has a 23.5% missed tackle rate. The figure ranks in the bottom 8% for his position in the country. 

He also needs to improve his hands and develop another go-to move as a rusher, Rogers said.

“As a pass rusher, he’s kind of the guy that’s like ‘I’m the freakiest athlete on the field.’ But if somebody gets under his pads and gets him into trouble, he doesn’t really know how to counter off of it,” Rogers said. “So you’ve got to believe in your coaching staff if you take this guy in the top 15.”

To his credit, Stewart knows he’s a work in progress. Asked about the area he most wants to improve heading into the league, he said finishing plays. 

“Being more composed when I’m a step away from the quarterback,” he told Simms. “That’s something that I definitely want to work on.” 

Stewart is projected anywhere from No. 10 to the end of the first round. Rogers pointed to the Bears, the Jets, the Lions, the Chargers and the Packers as possible landing spots. 

Whoever selects him knows he has one (major) flaw to go along with exceptional physical attributes. It’s on them to decide if it’s worth it.

“The only thing we can talk about is ‘he should have had a few more sacks; he let the quarterback out of his hands a few times,’” Simms said on the podcast. “I’m not going to blow it out of proportion. I think there’s plenty of good to go around, and he’s got a superstar future in front of him.”

Walgreens has agreed to pay $300 million to settle U.S. prosecutors’ allegations that it illegally filled millions of invalid prescriptions for opioids and other controlled substances, the U.S. Justice Department said on Monday.

The money, plus 4% interest annually, will be paid out over six years under the terms of the agreement. Walgreens will also owe the U.S. an additional $50 million if the company is sold, merged, or transferred prior to fiscal year 2032, the Justice Department said.

“We strongly disagree with the government’s legal theory and admit no liability,” Walgreens spokesperson Fraser Engerman said in a statement. “Our pharmacists are dedicated healthcare professionals who care deeply about patient safety and continue to play a critical role in providing education and resources to help combat opioid misuse and abuse across our country.”

The company said in a filing with U.S. regulators that it did not expect any major cases over opioids in the future.

The government’s January lawsuit alleged Walgreens ignored “red flags” that prescriptions were illegal and filled them anyway, violating the Controlled Substances Act. The government also alleged it violated the False Claims Act when it then sought reimbursement from federal health care programs, like Medicare, for the prescriptions.

Walgreens is among the drug manufacturers, distributors, pharmacy operators and others who have collectively in recent years agreed to pay about $50 billion to resolve lawsuits and investigations by states and local governments accusing them of helping fuel a deadly opioid addiction epidemic in the U.S.

Walgreens in 2022 agreed to pay up to $5.52 billion over 15 years to resolve thousands of lawsuits by state and local governments accusing the company of fueling the U.S. opioid epidemic.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says nearly 727,000 opioid overdose deaths occurred from 1999 to 2022.

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Detectives investigating the death of a Washington state woman whose body was found buried under a shed discovered a letter at the suspect’s home that described a planned burglary and sexual assault, the Thurston County sheriff said Monday.

The injuries that killed Marcia Norman, 82, included trauma from a pneumatic nailer, Thurston County Coroner Gary Warnock said.

“Her onset from injury to death was not instant. It was hours,” Warnock said. He said the case was the worst he has seen in his career.

Jeffrey Zizz, 47, a handyman who worked for Norman, was booked Sunday on charges of murder, kidnapping and unlawful disposal of human remains. He is expected to be formally charged by Wednesday, Thurston County Prosecuting Attorney Jon Tunheim.

Zizz had a preliminary court appearance Monday and has not yet entered a plea.

He was being held without bail Monday. Online court records did not show an attorney who could speak on his behalf Monday night.

Norman was found April 9 buried under a shed in a shallow grave with concrete poured overtop after cadaver dogs alerted on the property and following the use of ground-penetrating radar, the sheriff’s office said.

Zizz was the last person to see Norman on April 1, and investigators later learned he had dinner with her that night, Sheriff Derek Sanders said.

Norman’s family reported suspicious circumstances regarding a missing person April 4.

Searches the next day at Zizz’s house and room uncovered “a five-page letter which meticulously planned out a burglary and sexual assault of a woman who is referred to as his customer,” Sanders said.

The letter is part of the investigation. Sanders said “there are similarities” in what’s described in the letter and what evidence shows happened in the Norman case, he said.

“That part we’re still investigating,” Sanders said, adding that detectives have a lot of follow-up work to do. “The letter that they uncovered is extremely disturbing.”

There is no evidence of sexual assault, officials said.

A motive in the killing is not clear. “If I had to guess at this point in time, it’s because the suspect that we have in custody is a violent person,” Sanders said.

Officials said Zizz fled to Montana as detectives investigated Norman’s disappearance. Authorities in Thurston County obtained an arrest warrant for a probation violation from a previous child molestation case, officials said.

Zizz was arrested in Missoula, Montana, on April 7 and extradited to Washington on April 13, the sheriff’s office said.

Zizz had been initially interviewed in Norman’s disappearance and his answers seemed reasonable, Sanders said, but a license plate reader in Olympia contradicted his claim he was home the night she disappeared.

“That was the first step in which we were able to put him into a lie and then expand further,” Sanders said.

An arraignment is scheduled for May 6, he said.

After three weeks of jury selection, a panel of nine men and nine women has been seated in the murder retrial of Karen Read.

Read, whose trial in the death of her police officer boyfriend exposed allegations of law enforcement misconduct, returned to court in suburban Boston this month to be retried on charges of second-degree murder and other crimes.

Read’s widely publicized first trial ended with a hung jury last summer.

The heart of the trial is set to begin Tuesday with opening statements.

Here are key dates in the case.

Jan. 29, 2022: John O’Keefe is found dead

John O’Keefe, a 16-year veteran of the Boston Police Department, was found unresponsive in the yard of a now-retired Boston police sergeant, Brian Albert. O’Keefe, 46, was pronounced dead shortly afterward, and a medical examiner attributed his death to hypothermia and blunt-force trauma to the head.

The night before, the couple had been drinking with other law enforcement officers in Canton, just south of Boston, before they drove to an afterparty at Albert’s home.

What followed was not captured on video, and no witnesses have claimed to have seen what led to O’Keefe’s death. But lawyers for Read, an equity analyst who’d been together with O’Keefe for two years, later said she dropped him off at Albert’s home and watched him go inside.  

Read’s defense team said that hours later, after she discovered that her boyfriend never came home, she went out looking for him and, eventually, discovered his body in the snow outside Albert’s home.   

In court, Albert denied that O’Keefe ever entered his home. And after Read was arrested on charges of second-degree murder, motor vehicular manslaughter while driving under the influence and leaving the scene of a collision causing death, prosecutors painted a different picture of what investigators believe happened.

April 2024: A widely watched first trial

When Read’s trial got underway last April, the Norfolk County District Attorney’s Office described a relationship in shambles and a drunken defendant so furious with her partner that she backed into him with her Lexus SUV and left him for dead.

Adam Lally, the assistant district attorney who prosecuted the case, pointed to vehicle data that captured Read reversing her Lexus for 60 feet at 24 mph outside Albert’s home and forensic testing that showed O’Keefe’s hair found on the vehicle’s bumper.

Also found on the vehicle’s bumper were the remnants of a drink — O’Keefe was seen leaving a bar that night with a cocktail in hand — and bits of a drinking glass, Lally said.

Read’s defense team was allowed to make a third-party culprit defense, permitting it to call witnesses and present evidence supporting an alternative theory of O’Keefe’s death.

According to that theory, O’Keefe was fatally beaten and bitten by a dog in Albert’s home. Her legal team alleged that Read was framed by Albert and another person who’d been at the party — an agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives who’d traded flirtatious texts with Read before, the defense said, she ghosted him. (Albert testified that O’Keefe never entered his home but that he would have been welcomed with “open arms” if he had.)

The defense also accused the lead investigator in the case, former Massachusetts State Trooper Michael Proctor, of manipulating evidence, failing to properly examine the case and leading a biased investigation. Among the evidence introduced were text messages that showed Proctor using derogatory language to describe Read to friends, family members and supervisors.

At one point, Proctor said he hoped Read would take her own life.

Proctor acknowledged making unprofessional comments about Read and sharing details of the investigation with his sister, who was close friends with Albert’s sister-in-law, but he said he provided only “newsworthy stuff,” and he denied that his conduct compromised the integrity of the investigation.  

July 1: A mistrial is declared

After a nine-week trial and five days of deliberations, Norfolk County Superior Court Judge Beverly Cannone declared a mistrial when jurors failed to reach a unanimous verdict.

The Norfolk County district attorney vowed to retry the case and appointed Hank Brennan, a former prosecutor and longtime criminal defense lawyer who previously represented Boston gangster James “Whitey” Bulger, to be lead prosecutor.

The defense sought to have the crimes dismissed, alleging “extraordinary governmental misconduct” and saying that retrying her for two of the charges, including murder, amounted to double jeopardy. The lawyers made the second claim after, they said, two jurors came forward after the trial and said the panel would have acquitted Read of those crimes.

Judges in superior and federal court denied both claims.

March 19: Lead investigator Michael Proctor is fired

A trial board with the Massachusetts State Police fired Proctor after it determined he violated agency rules by sending derogatory texts about Read and shared confidential investigative details with non-law enforcement personnel.

The panel also found that he drank alcohol on duty and drove his cruiser afterward.

Proctor has not publicly commented on his termination. His family said they were “truly disappointed” with the board’s decision, which they said “unfairly exploits and scapegoats one of their own, a trooper with a 12-year unblemished record.”

“Despite the Massachusetts State Police’s dubious and relentless efforts to find more inculpatory evidence against Michael Proctor on his phones, computers and cruiser data, the messages on his personal phone — referring to the person who killed a fellow beloved Boston Police Officer — are all that they found,” the family said in a statement.

“The messages prove one thing, and that Michael is human — not corrupt, not incompetent in his role as a homicide detective, and certainly not unfit to continue to be a Massachusetts State Trooper,” the statement added.

It isn’t clear what role Proctor will play in the retrial, and legal experts told NBC News that his presence is likely to loom over the proceedings.

April 1: The second trial gets underway

Jury selection began in Read’s retrial in a Norfolk County courtroom, with prosecutors and defense lawyers questioning hundreds of potential jurors.

After three weeks of screening jurors, the panel was seated.

The 18 jurors include six alternates.

Opening statements are expected to start in the Massachusetts courtroom Tuesday.

Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., defended tech billionaire Elon Musk at a town hall Monday night at which he was grilled about the Department of Government Efficiency‘s cost-cutting measures and the Trump administration’s efforts to eliminate diversity initiatives and its approach to the Israel-Hamas war.

Donalds, a member of the House Oversight Committee, was pressed at one point about what the Republican-led panel was doing to ensure oversight of Musk and DOGE as the administration moves to dramatically reshape the federal government and slash spending.

“If you’re going to talk about what Oversight is doing, we actually have to let the DOGE committee, the DOGE department, actually finish its work,” Donalds said at the event in Estero, Florida.

He also defended the Trump administration’s efforts to end diversity, equity and inclusion programs, arguing it was a “false premise” that the absence of such initiatives in boardrooms and classrooms meant that “somehow minority kids cannot get ahead. It is a lie.”

“There’s no level playing field in life; it doesn’t exist,” said Donalds, one of the few Black Republicans in Congress.

After a man in the audience shouted that Donalds ought to read a particular book, Donalds fired back, telling the man not to “educate me about my life, sir.”

“I love how everybody is shouting at me, the Black guy with the microphone in his hand onstage,” Donalds said. “Don’t marginalize my life and what I’ve done. Don’t do that.”

Throughout the town hall, dozens of people left, many voicing frustration with answers from Donalds, who is running for governor of Florida in next year’s election.

Toward the end of the event, Donalds clashed with an audience member over his response to a question about the Israel-Hamas war.

“We should stand behind Israel 100%,” Donalds said. “I stand by our ally, which is Israel.”

When the audience member stood and loudly protested his pro-Israel stance, Donalds said she was disrespecting “everybody in this room” with her conduct.

“You think you’re being heard, and let’s be clear, you’re not,” Donalds said. “We laid the rules out. You are being rude and disrespectful. You are not the only person who has a point of view in this room.”

Shouts of “Free Palestine!” from a small number of audience members could be heard as the woman left the venue, followed by police.

There were no arrests.

Donalds is one of a handful of Republicans who have held town halls after Rep. Richard Hudson, R-N.C., who chairs the National Republican Congressional Committee, advised GOP lawmakers in a closed-door meeting last month against holding the events amid harsh criticism from angry attendees at town halls earlier this year.

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., held a town hall last week at which some audience members were arrested and stunned by police, while others were removed from the event.

The wife of detained Columbia University graduate student Mahmoud Khalil announced the birth of the couple’s son Monday, noting her husband was not able to witness the event.

Dr. Noor Abdalla, a Michigan-born dentist who was with Khalil when federal agents arrested him on March 8, said she requested his presence at the birth but was denied by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“Despite our request for ICE to allow Mahmoud to attend the birth, they denied his temporary release to meet our son,” Abdalla said in a statement Monday afternoon. “This was a purposeful decision by ICE to make me, Mahmoud, and our son suffer.”

A spokesperson for the couple did not immediately respond to questions about the baby’s name. ICE did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Khalil, who grew up in a Palestinian refugee camp in Syria and was granted permanent U.S. resident status last year, became a figurehead amid pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia last year, when he served as a mediator between student groups participating in a campus encampment and administrators at the New York City school.

U.S. agents, including one from Homeland Security Investigations, arrested Khalil at his home at a student housing complex on campus. He was detained as he returned from iftar, a meal that breaks the traditional Islamic fast during the holy month of Ramadan, Abdalla has said.

“Despite seeing the green card, they insisted that they would be bringing him in anyway,” Abdalla said in a court filing challenging Khalil’s arrest and no-bail status.

The legal rationale for Khalil’s detention didn’t become entirely clear until three days later, when the State Department said in a statement that Secretary of State Marco Rubio has the discretion, under a rarely used federal law, to remove any noncitizen deemed to “have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States.”

Federal authorities also later alleged that Khalil lied on his application for permanent residency, a deportable offense. That claim relies on unverified tabloid reports — some of which were published after he submitted his paperwork for residency — and mischaracterizations of his work and activism, according to an NBC News review of evidence filed in the case.

An immigration judge in Louisiana ruled this month that Rubio has the discretion to deport Khalil and that efforts to do so may move forward. Khalil’s lawyers are challenging the ruling, which has a deadline of Wednesday before it goes into effect, and have separately filed an appeal of his arrest in federal criminal court in New Jersey.

“Mahmoud remains unjustly detained in an ICE detention center over 1,000 miles away from his firstborn child,” Abdalla said in her statement Monday. “My son and I should not be navigating his first days on earth without Mahmoud. ICE and the Trump administration have stolen these precious moments from our family in an attempt to silence Mahmoud’s support for Palestinian freedom.”

His lawyers argue Khalil was arrested over his protected free speech and his role in last year’s pro-Palestinian student protest movement.

Rubio said last month that the State Department has revoked the student visas of campus protesters he characterized as “lunatics.”

Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem accused Khalil of making Jewish students fearful while supporting terrorists. She said after his arrest that he “hates the United States and what we stand for.”

Khalil’s lawyers presented evidence that he welcomed the help of Jewish protesters during last year’s events, and they have denied he ever provided support to Hamas or any other terrorist organization.

“I will continue to fight every day for Mahmoud to come home to us,” Abdalla said Monday. “I know when Mahmoud is freed, he will show our son how to be brave, thoughtful, and compassionate, just like his dad.”

A woman accused Pro Football Hall of Famer and podcaster Shannon Sharpe of sexually assaulting and battering her and using his fame to “manipulate, control, subjugate and violate women” in a Nevada lawsuit filed Sunday.

The woman said she was 19 years old in 2023 when she first met Sharpe, 56, in a Los Angeles gym, leading to a “rocky consensual relationship” of nearly two years in which he was frequently “aggressive” and raped her, the civil complaint, filed in state court in Clark County, alleges.

The plaintiff accused Sharpe of failing to stop his actions despite her saying “no,” according to the complaint.

“After many months of manipulating and controlling Plaintiff — a woman more than thirty years younger than he — and repeatedly threatening to brutally choke and violently slap her, Sharpe refused to accept the answer no and raped Plaintiff, despite her sobbing and repeated screams of ‘no,’” the complaint alleges.

The plaintiff accused Sharpe of twice raping her in Las Vegas in October — ignoring her requests for him to stop — and of doing so again in January, according to the suit.

In a statement, Sharpe’s attorney said his client’s and the woman’s relationship was “consensual and sexual in nature — and, in many cases, initiated by her with specific and graphic requests.”

The statement included text messages it alleged the woman sent to Sharpe, which are sexually graphic in nature and in which she is alleged to consent to sex.

The suit is a “blatant and cynical attempt to shake down Mr. Sharpe for millions of dollars. It is filled with lies, distortions, and misrepresentations — and it will not succeed,” Lanny Davis, Sharpe’s counsel, said in the statement.

The complaint alleges Sharpe insisted on recording sexual encounters, sometimes without the plaintiff’s knowledge or consent, claiming they were for his personal use. Instead, he on multiple occasions shared the videos with his “friends and associates,” the suit says.

At one point, Sharpe forced the woman to have sex with him as he FaceTimed one of his childhood friends, according to the suit.

“Whenever Plaintiff would get up the courage to object to Sharpe’s outrageous conduct—which was not often—he would aggressively and angrily ‘put her back in her place,’” the complaint alleges.

Davis’ statement alleges the woman presented Sharpe with a secretly recorded video of a consensual sexual encounter in an effort to “extract a large financial settlement.”

“We believe the video has been heavily edited and taken entirely out of context, crafted to falsely portray a consensual act as non-consensual,” Davis said, adding that the woman has refused to provide the unedited video. It was not clear whether the video Davis referred to is one of the videos that are referred to in the suit.

Sharpe at one point figured out how to get into the woman’s apartment complex without her permission, according to the suit, which painted him as “controlling.”

The suit alleges that in one instance after a sexual encounter from the night before, Sharpe told the woman to be at his house by 9 p.m. When she arrived at 9:05 p.m., the plaintiff “experienced [Sharpe’s] rage for the first time,” the complaint alleges.

Sharpe screamed and berated the woman “for what felt like hours,” accused her of disrespecting him and wasting his time, and demanded she “learn obedience” if she wanted to be with him, the lawsuit says.

“Still enraged, Sharpe turned off the lights, grabbed her neck, and—just like the night before—began having sexual intercourse with her,” according to the complaint.

“Yelling at her, controlling her, forcibly grabbing her by the neck when he got upset, saying he was going to ‘kill her,’ and asserting dominance became the norm,” the suit alleges.

Sharpe apologized last year for going live on Instagram during an intimate act, an incident referred to in the complaint and which the woman alleges “humiliated her” because Sharpe was alleged to have told her they were in an exclusive relationship.

“This was a lie that not only hurt her emotionally—it made her fear for her sexual health and the risk of sexually transmitted disease,” the suit states.

The lawsuit was filed under “Jane Doe” by Houston attorney Tony Buzbee, who also represented several female massage therapists who accused quarterback Deshaun Watson of sexual assault.

Davis’ statement names the woman filing suit. NBC News does not name sexual assault victims unless they voluntarily identify themselves in public.

The suit seeks more than $50 million in compensatory and punitive damages.

Sharpe, a tight end, played 14 years in the NFL with the Denver Broncos and the Baltimore Ravens. He won three Super Bowls and was named to the Pro Bowl eight times.

“Shannon Sharpe isn’t just a sports icon — he’s something far worse,” the suit alleges. “He is a flawed, narcissistic individual who has spent years using his fame, power and influence to manipulate, control, subjugate and violate women.”

Sharpe was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2011 and has gone on to a long broadcasting career. He is currently employed by ESPN, where he appears on “First Take.”

An ESPN spokesperson said Monday night that the network has no comment on the lawsuit.

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