Lorenzen Wright

Lorenzen Wright
Wright in 2009
Personal information
Born (1975-11-04)November 4, 1975
Oxford, Mississippi
Died July 19, 2010 (aged 34)
Memphis, Tennessee
Nationality Americans
Listed height 6 ft 11 in (2.11 m)
Listed weight 260 lb (118 kg)
Career information
High school Booker T. Washington
(Memphis, Tennessee)
College Memphis (1994–1996)
NBA draft 1996 / Round: 1 / Pick: 7th overall
Selected by the Los Angeles Clippers
Playing career 1996–2009
Position Power forward / Center
Number 55, 42
Career history
1996–1999 Los Angeles Clippers
1999–2001 Atlanta Hawks
2001–2006 Memphis Grizzlies
2006–2008 Atlanta Hawks
2008 Sacramento Kings
2008–2009 Cleveland Cavaliers
Career highlights and awards
Career NBA statistics
Points 6,191 (7.9 ppg)
Rebounds 4,943 (6.3 rpg)
Assists 622 (0.8 apg)
Stats at Basketball-Reference.com
Medals
Men's Basketball
Representing  United States
Summer Universiade
1995 Fukuoka Team competition

Lorenzen Vern-Gagne Wright (November 4, 1975 – July 19, 2010[1]) was an American professional basketball player who played thirteen seasons in the National Basketball Association. He was drafted 7th overall in the 1996 NBA draft by the Los Angeles Clippers, and also played for the Atlanta Hawks, Memphis Grizzlies, Sacramento Kings and Cleveland Cavaliers.

Wright went missing on July 18, 2010, and his body was found several days later, having been shot to death. In December 2017, seven years after his death, Wright's ex-wife Sherra Wright-Robinson was charged with his murder.

Early life and college

Raised in Oxford, Mississippi, Wright played all levels of basketball in Memphis – high school, collegiate and professional. His father, Herb, was a professional basketball player who competed in Finland and once had a tryout with the Utah Jazz. When Wright was seven years old, Herb was working for the Memphis Police Department when he was paralyzed by a gunshot to the back.[2]

Wright was recognized as a Third Team All-America by the Associated Press as a sophomore at the University of Memphis. Wright is a member of Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity.

Professional career

After being selected seventh overall by the Los Angeles Clippers in the 1996 NBA Draft out of the University of Memphis, Wright moved on to the Atlanta Hawks in 1999. He was traded to the Memphis Grizzlies in 2001, but returned to the Hawks in 2006.

On February 16, 2008, he was involved in a multi-player trade, going from Atlanta to Sacramento for Mike Bibby.[3]

He held career averages of 8.0 points and 6.4 rebounds per game, playing in 778 (793 including playoffs) NBA games over 13 seasons.

Personal life

Wright founded the Sierra Simone Wright Scholarship Fund after the death of his infant daughter in March 2003. During the summer of 2003, he returned to the University of Memphis to finish his degree. Wright was survived by his parents and six children.

During his first stint in Atlanta, Wright and three other Memphis-native NBA players (Todd Day, Penny Hardaway and Elliot Perry) provided financial assistance to Travis Butler, a Memphis orphan whose tragic story garnered national attention.[4]

Disappearance and death

According to his ex-wife, Wright left his home in Collierville, Tennessee, on the night of July 18, 2010, with drugs and an unspecified amount of money, and was not seen or heard from again.[5] His family filed a missing persons report on July 22.[6][7] After Wright's body was found on July 28 in a wooded area on Callis Cutoff Road just west of Hacks Cross Road, it was reported that a 9-1-1 call had been received from his cell phone in the early morning of July 19 by the Germantown, Tennessee, 911 dispatch center; the caller was speaking with the dispatcher when 11 gunshots rang out.[8] The dispatcher did not report the call to his supervisor until eight days later, hindering the police investigation and resulting in a payout to Wright's family.[2] The case was investigated as a homicide.[9] Wright's body is buried in Calvary Cemetery in Memphis, Tennessee. In 2011, a reward for information related to the killing stood at $21,000: the state of Tennessee contributed $10,000, the city of Memphis and the Memphis Grizzlies each promised $5,000, and Crime Stoppers promised $1,000.[10]

On November 9, 2017, the gun believed to have been used to murder Wright was found in a Walnut, Mississippi, lake.[11] On December 5, 2017, Billy R. Turner, Shelby County landscaper and church deacon at Mt. Olive No. 1 Missionary Baptist Church in Collierville, TN, was indicted on first-degree murder charges and held on $1 million bond.[5]

On December 15, 2017, Wright's ex-wife, Sherra Wright-Robinson, was arrested in California in connection with the murder. Wright-Robinson was a former member of Turner's church. The seven-year investigation into his death has been one of the Memphis Police Department's most high-profile unsolved cases. Wright's mother, Deborah Marion, told The Commercial Appeal newspaper that a police official told her Wright-Robinson will be charged with first-degree murder, the same charge Turner faces. Marion said she believes her former daughter-in-law was motivated by money, specifically a $1-million life insurance policy held by Lorenzen Wright.[12][13]

In a 2015 article in The Commercial Appeal, Wright-Robinson explained how she inquired early in the investigation whether she was a suspect.

"They was like, no, you know," she said. "It was just kind of a person of interest. They said that the list was long and wide and they didn't have any real suspects, if you want to quote that."

Records showed that on August 1, 2010, Memphis police searched her home and found burned pieces of metal and a letter addressed to her and Lorenzen Wright, but law enforcement at that time did not say what the items meant to investigators.

In 2014, Wright-Robinson agreed to a confidential settlement of a dispute in Circuit Court over how she spent the $1 million of insurance money meant to benefit their six children.[14]

On March 19, 2018, ABC News reported that prosecutors announced at a pre-trial hearing that day that they would not be seeking the death penalty for either defendant. Both defendants will be tried together on charges of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder.

NBA career statistics

Legend
  GP Games played   GS  Games started  MPG  Minutes per game
 FG%  Field goal percentage  3P%  3-point field goal percentage  FT%  Free throw percentage
 RPG  Rebounds per game  APG  Assists per game  SPG  Steals per game
 BPG  Blocks per game  PPG  Points per game  Bold  Career high

Regular season

Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG
1996–97 L.A. Clippers 775125.1.481.250.5876.1.6.6.87.3
1997–98 L.A. Clippers 693830.0.445.000.6598.8.8.81.39.0
1998–99 L.A. Clippers 481523.6.458.000.6927.5.7.5.86.6
1999–2000 Atlanta 75016.1.499.333.6444.1.3.4.56.0
2000–01 Atlanta 714628.0.448.000.7187.51.2.6.912.4
2001–02 Memphis 433329.1.459.000.5699.41.0.7.512.0
2002–03 Memphis 704928.3.454.000.6597.51.1.7.811.4
2003–04 Memphis 654625.8.439.000.7336.81.1.7.99.4
2004–05 Memphis 807728.6.469.000.6627.71.1.7.99.6
2005–06 Memphis 785821.7.478.000.5645.1.6.7.65.8
2006–07 Atlanta 673115.4.448.000.2813.2.6.4.42.6
2007–08 Atlanta 13111.4.294.000.5002.8.2.2.21.0
2007–08 Sacramento 502.6.250.000.000.2.2.0.0.4
2008–09 Cleveland 1727.4.370.000.3751.5.2.2.31.4
Career 77844723.8.459.069.6456.4.8.6.78.0

See also

Playoffs

Year Team GP GS MPG FG% 3P% FT% RPG APG SPG BPG PPG
1997 L.A. Clippers 3330.7.406.0001.0007.3.71.0.710.3
2004 Memphis 4425.0.435.000.3334.3.51.0.55.5
2005 Memphis 4421.3.571.000.5005.02.3.3.38.3
2006 Memphis 4021.5.611.000.7005.0.8.01.07.3
Career 151124.2.495.000.6525.31.1.5.67.7

References

  1. ↑ "New Details In The Lorenzen Wright Mystery" ABC 24 Eyewitness News, Memphis July 28, 2010
  2. 1 2 Wertheim, Jon (October 18, 2015). "Who killed Lorenzen Wright? Murder still a mystery". Sports Illustrated. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  3. ↑ "Kings trading Bibby to Hawks for 4 players". ESPN.com. February 16, 2008.
  4. ↑ "NBA Players Donate $10,000 To Memphis Boy Who Lived With Mother's Corpse". Findarticles.com. 2000. Retrieved July 28, 2010.
  5. 1 2 Fretland, Katie; Connolly, Daniel; Moore, Linda A.; Jones, Yolanda (December 5, 2017). "Lorenzen Wright killing: Shelby County man arrested, charged with murder in death of former NBA player". The Commercial Appeal. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  6. ↑ Lorenzen Wright: Former Tigers & Grizzlies Player Missing, Accessed July 23, 2010 Archived August 11, 2011, at the Wayback Machine.
  7. ↑ Gabriel Falcon, CNN (July 27, 2010). "Police investigate disappearance of former NBA player Lorenzen Wright". CNN.com. Retrieved July 28, 2010.
  8. ↑ Goetz, Kristina. "Missing Memphis basketball star Lorenzen Wright found dead". The Commercial Appeal. Retrieved July 30, 2010.
  9. ↑ "Police: Former NBA big man Lorenzen Wright was shot to death - NBA - SI.com". Sports Illustrated. July 29, 2010. Archived from the original on July 31, 2010. Retrieved September 5, 2013.
  10. ↑ Connolly, Daniel (November 13, 2017). "$21,000 reward available for tips in homicide of basketball standout Lorenzen Wright". The Commercial Appeal. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  11. ↑ Fretland, Katie; Perrusquia, Marc (November 9, 2017). "Memphis police: Gun suspected in Lorenzen Wright case recovered in Mississippi lake". The Commercial Appeal. Retrieved 6 December 2017.
  12. ↑ "Lorenzen Wright's ex-wife Sherra Wright arrested in California, charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy".
  13. ↑ "Lorenzen Wright's ex-wife Sherra arrested in California in connection with his death". The Commercial Appeal. Retrieved 2017-12-16.
  14. ↑ "CA Investigation: Memphis police no closer to finding star's killer 5 years later". Retrieved 2017-12-16.
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