After Making Late-Night Pass, Big Ben Left Scrambling

The news just gets worse and worse for Ron Mexico Roethlisberger. That's bad news for all of us who want to take the high road.

Anytime somebody is accused of a crime we invoke "innocent until proven guilty" and giving people the "benefit of the doubt." Then I read where Roethlisberger was in a bathroom last Friday night.

Not just any bathroom, but a women's bathroom.

At a college bar. At 2:30 a.m. With an underage 20-year-old coed.

This raises a few questions: Was the men's room full? Is Big Ben a closet transvestite? Did the girl request a private reenactment of Roethlisberger's 2006 motorcycle crash?

Yeah, that's it. Then she slipped, banged her head, and encountered Roethlisberger's DNA and suddenly got $$$ in her eyes.

Sarcasm usually isn't called for in a sexual-assault case, but this one is quickly veering into Saturday Night Live territory. A Super Bowl-winning quarterback fooling around with a coed in a women's room?

I'm trying to recall the last time that happened to Tom Brady or Peyton Manning. At least they would deserve the benefit of the doubt. This one is so incriminating even ESPN is reporting it.

You'll recall the network resisted informing us about the sexual assault suit filed against Roethlisberger last summer. That was civil, and this is criminal. So ESPN has joined the Big Ben feeding frenzy.

It's already been established that he's an idiot. Make that idiot squared, considering Roethlisberger didn't learn anything from last year's trip through the sexual assault mud.

Nobody is saying a single, 28-year-old multimillionaire shouldn't go out and have a good time. But unwritten rules come with being a famous NFL quarterback.

Rule No. 1-- Don't end up in a women's bathroom at 2:30 a.m.

Just because you do doesn't mean you're a sexual predator, of course. It's just that Roethlisberger has acknowledged "sexual contact." It's unclear what he means by that, but I keep getting flashbacks of Bill Clinton getting cross-examined about a blue dress.

It is no longer a question of whether something happened. From William Kennedy Smith to Mike Tyson to the accused rapist on your 11 o'clock news, this is going to come down to one question:

Was it consensual?

The man will say yes. The woman will say no.

They are the only ones who will ever know the truth. And they may truly believe they are right and the other person is lying.


But how could Roethlisberger ever allow himself to be put in such a position?

Oh yeah, we already established he's an idiot. On to more late-breaking developments:

The circumstantial evidence.

For some Pittsburgh fans, the only circumstance that matters is that Roethlisberger is a franchise quarterback. If he played for Baltimore, they'd be ready to send him to Leavenworth.

Speaking of which, imagine if we changed all the "Roethlisbergers" to "Vick" in this story. Roger Goodell would have run him out of the league by 9 a.m. Saturday. Though as Big Ben fans would point out, at least their hero didn't seek herpes treatment under the alias Ron Mexico.

He certainly wasn't trying to hide his identity Friday night. According to various reports, Roethlisberger and his posse bar-hopped the night away. The $102-million frat boy enjoyed the usual celebrity adulation.

At one bar, a student named Amber Hanley asked Roethlisberger to pose for a picture with her friend. He seemed disappointed that's all she wanted.

"Hanley said she rolled her eyes, and Roethlisberger called her an expletive and walked away," the AP reported. Later, Roethlisberger was aggressively hitting on another girl, Hanley said.

Maybe she just said that because she's a Brady fan. Maybe Roethlisberger's 20-year-old accuser is a gold-digger who stalks rich prey. Unlike last year's accuser, however, she went straight to police.

They took her to a hospital, where she presumably went through sexual assault protocols. Now police are asking Roethlisberger for a DNA sample. That means they they have something that potentially matches.

No word yet whether Roethlisberger will cooperate. His lawyer did say his firm has hired a team of investigators.

You can be sure it's pouring over the accuser's history looking for signs of mental instablity, promiscuity and cheering for the Ravens. How long until Team Roethlisberer hires Ari Fleischer for damage control?

"The fans and the people that believe in him should be patient," attorney Ed Garland said. "The truth will come out."

Will it?

Barring a bombshell, like Roethlisberger showing up at trial in a low-cut gown, this looks like a classic He-Said, She-Said. I'd hate to have to decide such a case.

Fortunately, I won't have to. Neither will you unless you are in the Baldwin County, Ga. jury pool. We can form opinions and discuss the case before the verdict is read.

So forgive me for veering off the high road. I really would like to give Roethsliberger the benefit of the doubt. But the more I hear, the more I come back to one simple question:

Why?