According to a press release by the facility, Phillips, 40, was found unresponsive in his cell at 12:05 a.m. Wednesday morning, January 13.
The former Nebraska Cornhusker, who played four years in the NFL, had been locked in segregation since being suspected of killing his cellmate Damion Soward on April 11, 2015.
In September he was formally charged with first-degree murder.
Phillips was an extremely gifted athlete, but couldn’t stay out of trouble off the field.
Despite being accused of dragging an ex-girlfriend by her hair down a flight of stairs while at Nebraska, he was drafted with the sixth overall pick in the 1996 NFL draft by the St. Louis Rams. He played two years for them before being released for insubordination in 1997.
His last two years in the league were spent with the Miami Dolphins and the San Francisco 49ers.
He’d been in prison since 2005, and was currently serving a 31-year sentence for choking his ex-girlfriend twice in San Diego and driving a car into a group of teens, injuring three, after getting angry that his team was losing a pickup football game in Los Angeles.
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