CHICAGO – Bears defensive end Mario Edwards Jr. has been suspended without pay for the first two games of the 2021 regular season for violating the NFL’s policy on performance-enhancing substances, the league announced Friday.
Edwards Jr. is no longer under contract with Bears and will be a free agent in March. He will have to execute the suspension whenever he signs with a team, but will be eligible to participate in pre-season games and training.
Edwards Jr. had four career sacks while a member of the Bears in 2020.
The NFL is also investigating a legal issue involving Edwards Jr., which resulted from an incident last year at a hotel in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Edwards Jr., 26, received a criminal summons on a charge of assault on a woman, according to a spokesman for the Mecklenburg County Prosecutor’s Office in North Carolina in December.
A trial date has not yet been set, but the summons came from a situation at the Hilton Charlotte City Center hotel on October 17, the night before the Bears played the Carolina Panthers.
Police documents said officers responded to reports of a woman hitting a man with her hand and scratching her forehead. Edwards and a woman both had bruises and scratches, and both were listed as victims in the police report.
North Carolina court documents obtained by TMZ said the woman in question accused Edwards of hitting her in the eye and dragging her out of his hotel room after she began recording him during a dispute. . The woman said she was pregnant at the time of the attack and needed hospitalization.
Peter Schaffer, Edwards’ agent, denied that his client had been involved in any wrongdoing.