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UFC heavyweight champion Jon Jones was arrested Saturday based on allegations that he assaulted and threatened to kill a drug testing agent, police in New Mexico said.
The case was prompted by a complaint from a drug-test sample collection worker, Crystal Martinez, who said she and a colleague had gone to Jones’ Albuquerque home at 4 a.m. on March 30 to collect urine for a surprise drug test on behalf of their employer, Drug Free Sport International, which is contracted by UFC.
The UFC, Drug Free Sport International, and Jones’ manager did not immediately respond to requests for comment Saturday evening.
Speaking in a statement posted on his Instagram account, Jones said one of the sample collectors involved in the incident last month behaved “unprofessionally.” He admitted being frustrated, but said the encounter “ended friendly and amicably.”
“Nothing threatening at all,” he said.
Martinez said Jones was unhappy with the collection process and was initially unable to produce urine, prompting her to suggest a blood test, according to a police report.
The suggestion, she said, made him even more angry, the report said.
Jones allegedly threatened to sue the two sample collectors, the report states, citing Martinez. She believed the fighter might have been drunk, she said, according to the report.
Amid the possibility that UFC fines could kick in if urine for a drug test wasn’t produced on the spot, Jones walked away with sample collection colleague Jerome Romero and returned with a sample, according to the report.
At one point Jones picked Martinez’s phone up off a surface and started recording the interaction, the woman told police. Officer Miguel Andres Stanley said in his portion of the report that he reviewed the video on Martinez’s phone purportedly recorded by Jones.
It captured the mixed martial arts star saying, “Here f—— Jerome and his girlfriend in my garage,” according to the police report.
Martinez said the fighter got his face near hers and said, “Why you f—— people come so early? Do you know what happens to people who come to my house? They end up dead.”
She asked for her phone to be returned, to no avail, the report said. The woman said she feared for her safety and wanted to terminate the session but also feared that would set off Jones because it would lead to UFC fines.
When Jones walked off with Romero to produce a sample, Martinez said she took the opportunity to get her phone, which she said Jones had put down, according to the report. Martinez texted her boss about the situation, the report said.
Romero returned from collecting a sample from Jones looking frightened and pale, she said, per the report.
“Mr. Jones was not very happy to see them there and his behavior at times was hostile,” the report says Romero told officers.
Afterward, Martinez said she told superiors she wanted to push for charges to be filed against the fighter, even as she said her supervisor discouraged it and said she should wait for the UFC to respond.
Jones called Martinez a liar, said he never threatened her or her coworker, and said he believed she was unhappy because of offensive language he used in his garage as they attempted to collect urine, according the police report.
Jones was interviewed on Saturday by phone, it said.
He also expressed dismay with Romero, admitting that he threatened to sue him for bringing his partner and having her wait outside in a vehicle, saying he believed this was a violation of a federal patient privacy law, the report states.
Jones said he never spoke of people facing death if they arrive at his home too early, but police quoted his recollection of what he told Martinez: “Tell everyone at headquarters not to send people to my home so early because it could be a dangerous environment.”
Jones told police he apologized for any profanity, and he noted to police that he gave Martinez a high-five, according to the report. “We exchanged a high five and a hug,” Jones said on Instagram, speaking of both sample collection workers.
Jones was issued a summons to appear in court based on allegations of assault and interfering with communications. The summons doubled as his arrest, and it doesn’t appear Jones was taken into custody or booked.
It’s not the first time Jones has been in trouble with the law.
In 2015, he was stripped of his light heavyweight championship following his arrest in connection to a hit-and-run crash that injured a pregnant woman. In 2021, he was arrested in Las Vegas on a domestic battery charge for allegedly grabbing his fiancée by her hair. As part of a plea deal in the case, he pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor property damage charge for damaging a police vehicle during his arrest.
Jones has also been suspended for doping. In 2018, he was handed a 15-month suspension for his second violation of the UFC’s anti-doping policy.
He became UFC heavyweight champion in March 2023, and has a record of 27 wins, one loss, zero draws and one no contest, which signifies that neither competitor can be declared the winner.
In late December, UFC announced that Drug Free Sport International would conduct “no-notice sample collections” for its athlete drug tests under a new anti-doping policy that began Dec. 31.
In a statement at the time, the league described Drug Free Sport International as “a global leader in the anti-doping industry” that does similar sample collections for Major League Baseball, the NFL, NASCAR, the PGA and the NCAA.
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