CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – The charges against former University of Virginia football player Jahmal Edrine were nol-prossed, effectively pausing the case, in Albemarle Circuit Court on Thursday.

While Edrine’s attorneys, Rhonda Quagliana and Lawrence Woodward, Jr., characterized the decision as a victory for their client in a press release sent within minutes of the hearing, Assistant Commonwealth’s Attorney Susan Baumgartner maintained the case is not over.

“Many of the statements in Ms. Quagliana’s press release are false,” she told Cville Right Now in an email. “Most importantly, the charges have been nol-prossed rather than dismissed, which allows the Commonwealth to bring back the charges in the future. The Commonwealth wanted to do additional investigation on some collateral matters, which takes extra time in this case due to information and witnesses being out of state.

“The defendant would not agree to a continuance, so the Commonwealth chose to nol pros the current charges to allow time for that additional investigation.”

Circuit Court Judge Claude Worrell granted Baumgartner’s motion of nolle prosequi during the hearing in the Charlottesville Circuit Courtroom, temporarily dropping Edrine’s charges of rape and abduction, which he was arrested for in February. Edrine had been scheduled for a four-day jury trial beginning on Nov. 16.

“What happened to Jahmal was a true miscarriage of justice,” Quagliana and Woodward said in their release. “He was charged and arrested and has spent almost a year fighting these false accusations. We have always believed in Jahmal’s innocence and have argued for today’s outcome from the very beginning. We fought hard and secured additional evidence that led to today’s result.”

In recent months, the prosecution and defense in Edrine’s case had battled over the evidence, with the victim’s cell phone at the center of many of their disputes. During Edrine’s last appearance, Worrell, who had previously ordered the Commonwealth to provide the Defense with the data dump of the phone once it was complete, placed a protective order on the data to ensure the defense received.

In their release, Edrine’s attorneys called Worrell’s decision “a turning point in the case,” but added they were unable to discuss the contents due to the protective order.

“The prosecutor had the phone for months,” the attorneys said. “We wish the prosecution had granted our repeated requests for access to the phone months ago instead of forcing us to litigate the issue. We could have uncovered this exculpatory evidence long before the eve of trial.”

As they had done throughout the trial, the attorneys argued the timeline of events proved Edrine’s innocence, pointing to how the victim had deny that Edrine had raped her, contradicting the initial reports she made following the encounter in Aug. 2025.

Quagliana and Woodward also pointed to how the victim had voluntarily chosen to spend more time with Edrine at his apartment after the incident and had only told law enforcement she wanted to pursue charges less than 15 minutes after Edrine had told her not to contact him anymore in the early hours of Sept. 27, 2025.

“An innocent person should not have to sacrifice his education, his reputation, his peace of mind, and nearly a year of his life to establish what was true from the beginning,” Quagliana and Woodward said. “Jahmal deserves to have his good name restored. He deserves the opportunity to reclaim his life. Jahmal Edrine has been honest from the beginning. He has maintained his innocence from the beginning, and every criminal charge against him has been dismissed.”