Kyle Flood will coach Rutgers in its season opener against Norfolk State on Saturday despite an ongoing academic investigation and the arrest and suspension of five football players.
Hours after Flood said at practice Thursday he would coach, prosecutors announced the arrest and charges against 10 current and former Rutgers students, including five players, three of them starters.
Athletic director Julie Hermann said that the arrested players had been suspended. They include cornerback Nadir Barnwell, who is at the center of the investigation into whether Flood violated school or NCAA rules by contacting a faculty member about Barnwell's academic status.
Prosecutors announced Barnwell, defensive back Ruhann Peele, fullback Razohnn Gross and defensive back Delon Stephenson were charged with aggravated assault, riot and conspiracy to commit a riot for a fight in April that left a man with a broken jaw.
The Middlesex County prosecutor's office said defensive back Andre Boggs was charged in two home-invasion robberies in April and May.
Barnwell, Boggs and Stephenson were starters.
Five of the accused were charged in home invasions — including armed attempts to invade dorm rooms — in which they targeted other students for their drugs and money.
One victim's jaw was broken when he was set upon, in an unprovoked attack, when six of the men went after a group of four people walking down the street in New Brunswick, N.J., in April.
