NFL cornerback Daryl Worley is out of a job before he ever got a chance to suit up for the Super Bowl champs.

Worley, recently traded to the Philadelphia Eagles, was charged with violation of the uniform firearms act, driving under the influence, disorderly conduct-fighting and related offenses Monday, a day after police used a Taser on him and arrested the football player after he allegedly became combative.

The football player was passed out in his car Sunday morning near the teams’ practice facility in South Philadelphia. He reportedly became combative and police deployed their Taser.

The report said Worley was “in possession of a gun” when police found him.

The Eagles released Worley following his arrest.

Worley recently joined the reigning Super Bowl champions when he was traded from the Carolina Panthers in exchange for wide receiver Torrey Smith. Worley started 25 games in his two seasons with the Panthers.

Worley played college football at West Virginia. In 2014, he pleaded no contest to misdemeanor assault and was given a six-month suspended sentence after getting into an altercation with a woman outside a nightclub. Worley claimed that he was defending his girlfriend.

“It was a simple situation where it was wrong place at the wrong time. There [was] nothing malicious about the incident,” Worley told reporters at the time.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

HOUSTON (WPVI) —

Philadelphia Eagles All-Pro defensive end Michael Bennett surrendered to authorities in Houston on a charge that he injured a paraplegic woman as he tried to get onto the field after last year’s Super Bowl to celebrate with his brother.

Bennett made a brief court appearance Monday where the judge set his bond at $10,000 on a felony count of injury to the elderly. He is now is free on bond.

After the hearing his attorney, Rusty Hardin, said neither the district attorney nor the police have the whole story.

“If you look at this guy’s career, personality, his family, he would never assault an elderly person, a disabled person,” Hardin said.

A release from the district attorney’s office states that Bennett was a spectator and in Houston to watch his brother, then a player for the New England Patriots, on Feb. 5, 2017. After the game, Bennett allegedly shoved his way onto the field, where players were gathering to celebrate, according to the DA’s office.
NRG security personnel, including a 66-year-old paraplegic woman, told Bennett he had to use a different entrance for field access, but the defensive end pushed through them, including the woman.

Speaking at a news conference Friday, Houston Police chief Art Acevedo said Bennett allegedly told the people he had pushed, “You all must know who I am, and I can own this (expletive). I’m going down to the field, whether you like it or not.”

The woman suffered a sprained shoulder, according to Acevedo.

The injury to the elderly charge includes intentionally and knowingly causing bodily injury to a person 65 years or older and carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison and a $10,000 fine.

“Mr. Bennett might think that he’s an NFL player, and at that time and place, he thinks he doesn’t have to answer to police officer. I’m proud of the fact our department took the time to investigate this thoroughly,” Acevedo said.
Acevedo said a detective did not actively start working the case until September because the police department had prioritized more serious cases. There is no video of the alleged incident, according to Acevedo.

The Eagles said they are aware of the situation and gathering more information. A spokesman for the NFL said the league is looking into the matter.

Bennett was traded from the Seattle Seahawks to the Eagles along with a seventh-round pick on March 14 for a fifth-round pick and wide receiver Marcus Johnson.

Eagles executive vice president of football operations Howie Roseman, speaking at the NFL owners meeting in Orlando, Florida, said the team did not find out about the alleged incident until Friday, when the indictment was announced.

Roseman expressed full trust in the Seahawks organization and general manager John Schneider, dismissing any notion that Seattle might have withheld information, and said it was important to let the legal process play out.

“I think we’re in a great country, and in this country, people are presumed innocent, and I think we have to be fair about that in all these matters,” Roseman said. “I don’t think it’s fair in any situation to not give people the right to present their side. I don’t want to get into this, but our overriding philosophy on things are people are innocent until proven guilty.”

Roseman stressed that the Eagles do thorough background work on players before bringing them in, a process that includes talking to current members of the team about their experiences with that player. The feedback they received on Bennett, Roseman said, was positive.

“What we found out is that he is a good teammate. They like playing with him,” Roseman said. “Some of our players have been with him in the Pro Bowl; some of our players had trained with him, and we rely on information like that. Obviously, he came to our facility and we had a chance to sit down with him and talk to him.”

Roseman said the team has been in contact with Bennett since the alleged incident came to light.

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The Eagles are putting in extra practice hours as their season extends into the playoffs.

They’re also putting a little extra money into the city coffers.

Just like others who work or live in Philadelphia, Eagles players pay the city’s wage tax. And, as has long been the case for professional athletes, the city and state also collect taxes from players on visiting teams for their time spent working here.

So, with the Eagles’ home-field advantage in the playoffs, more than just the team’s season is on the line. A boost in the city’s tax revenue is, too.

Philadelphia could gain about $200,000 in wage taxes if the Eagles win next weekend and go on to host a second playoff game at Lincoln Financial Field, according to an Inquirer and Daily News analysis of the salaries of the Eagles roster and those of their potential opponents. With just one playoff game, the city would still gain; if the Eagles lose to the Atlanta Falcons on Saturday, their single playoff game will still raise more than $110,000 in wage taxes. 

“I’m quite confident that whatever club they’re playing will be on notice that Philadelphia will be taxing them,” said Stephen Kidder, a tax lawyer who represents the NFL Players Association, as well as the MLB, NBA, NHL, and major-league soccer players associations. The state of Pennsylvania also stands to gain thousands of dollars from income levies on players for NFL post-season games in both Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, where the Steelers are scheduled to host one game. The state could earn nearly $120,000 this weekend alone from players traveling to the two cities.

Philadelphia became one of the first cities to aggressively pursue income taxes from athletes in the 1990s, said Kidder, who is also a former Massachusetts revenue commissioner. Now, charging so-called jock taxes to players based on the location of their games is a widely accepted practice.

But controversy and court challenges arise over implementation. In the last three years, Tennessee reached separate settlements with NHL and NBA players, and had to refund the $2,500-a-game tax it had charged. In 2015, the Ohio Supreme Court sided with NFL players and struck down Cleveland’s 2 percent jock tax as unconstitutional.

Star athletes still make millions of dollars a year after paying taxes. But filing returns in multiple states can become a burden for players with smaller salaries, said Jared Walczak, a senior policy analyst for the Tax Foundation.

“It’s very complex, especially for players in minor-league sports, because the compliance costs are very high compared to their income,” he said. “If you are a minor-league baseball player and have to remit taxes back to 20 states, … that’s really complex.”

The Eagles’ office declined to discuss income taxes last week. The team does not discuss “financial details of our employees or players,” director of public relations Brett Strohsacker said.

Philadelphia works directly with sports teams to deduct taxes from paychecks, said Marisa Waxman, the city’s first deputy revenue commissioner.

The wage tax charged to athletes is a drop in the bucket of Philadelphia’s total tax revenue; wage taxes classified as coming from sports teams totaled $20 million, or just 1.1 percent of total wage tax revenue, in the fiscal year that ended June 30. But the taxes add up quickly for high-salaried athletes who spend just a few days in Philadelphia.

Waxman said the city calculates taxes owed by athletes by dividing their days spent working in Philadelphia by the total number of “duty days” — time spent in practice sessions, team meetings, and playing games.

The Inquirer and Daily News’ conservative estimate of the money the city stands to gain from the Eagles’ playoff run assumes that visiting teams will spend two days in Philadelphia and that none of the players lives in the city.

The taxes paid by opposing teams vary based on the players’ total salaries. The Falcons players will owe the city about $67,000 in wage taxes. The city would have earned about $70,000 if the Carolina Panthers came to Philadelphia next weekend and $65,000 from the New Orleans Saints.

Eagles players who live in the city pay the resident rate, but those who do not will be paying more in wage taxes for additional games and practice days during the playoffs. If none of the Eagles players lived in the city, for example, Philadelphia would gain more than $42,000 in extra wage taxes for one playoff game and $67,000 for two games.

The city also works to collect taxes on income earned in Philadelphia from workers who are not athletes.

“There are a variety of ways we find this information, including data matching and sharing with other jurisdictions and the IRS,” Waxman said.

The state of Pennsylvania  charges income tax to visiting athletes unless they live in states that have reciprocal agreements with Pennsylvania: Indiana, Maryland, New Jersey, Ohio, Virginia, and West Virginia.

The state revenue department does not analyze the total amount of income tax it receives from professional athletes, said communications director Jeffrey Johnson. He said the state does not count absences due to illness or injury as “working days” for athletes.

Eagles quarterback Carson Wentz, sidelined by a knee injury, lives in New Jersey and would not be paying Pennsylvania state income taxes. But is he still subject to the city wage tax?

Only when he’s attending team meetings or activities, Kidder said.

“The factual question is: Is he rendering a service to the team?” he said. “If he’s participating in team meetings then that becomes … an argument that the city might try to make.”