Ex-BU player indicted for sexual assault joins indoor team in N. Dakota

Former Baylor football standout Shawn Oakman, whose hopes of being picked up in the NFL draft were derailed by his April 13, 2016 arrest on a sexual assault charge, has joined the Bismarck Bucks indoor football team in North Dakota.

He’s listed on the team’s roster as a defensive lineman.

The Bucks joined Champions Indoor Football in 2016 and an expansion team and played their first season in 2017.

The team’s training camp opened on Feb. 18 and the Bucks are scheduled to open the season Friday against the Kansas City Phantoms.

The McLennan County Grand Jury indicted Oakman for sexual assault on July 20, 2016.

He’s remains free on a $25,000 bond.

Oakman was arrested 10 days after authorities executed a search warrant at his campus area apartment and six days after his 24th birthday.

Oakman maintains his innocence and says the sex was consensual, his attorney, Michelle Tuegel, said at the time of the indictment.

Oakman and the woman he's accused of sexually assaulting had "a previous intimate relationship that included numerous consensual sexual encounters...over a period of time before the alleged incident," she said.

The former defensive end was a two-time All-Big 12 selection who ranks first on Baylor's all-time sacks list and second on the school's all-time tackles for loss list.

He wasn't projected to be selected in the first round of the NFL draft in April, but was ranked in the top 100 before the sexual assault allegations surfaced.

Officers responded early in the morning on April 3, 2016 to the emergency room of Providence Health Center in response to a report of a sexual assault, according to the search warrant affidavit released in April.

The victim told police she met with the suspect, identified as Oakman, at Scruffy Murphy's, a campus-area club, and then walked with him to the nearby duplex, the affidavit said.

Once inside, the woman said that her clothing was forcibly removed and that she was forced onto the bed and sexually assaulted, the affidavit said.

The woman was able to leave after the alleged assault, but told police she left her panties in the duplex and that she lost an earring in the bedroom, the affidavit said.

At the hospital, the affidavit said, she was treated for unspecified injuries and a sexual assault examination was conducted, the affidavit said.

Officers "briefly spoke with Oakman," the affidavit said, "and he admitted to only having consensual sex with the victim."

The search warrant was issued just before 2 p.m. April 3, 2016 and then was executed that afternoon at a duplex in the 1200 block of James Avenue near the university campus.

Investigators seized two comforters, a fitted sheet and a flat sheet from the residence, according to the warrant's return and inventory.

The inventory did not include the woman's panties or the missing earring.

Oakman was arrested at around 2 p.m. on April 13, 2016 after meeting with Waco detectives about the sexual assault investigation, police Sgt. W. Patrick Swanton said.

During the meeting, police served Oakman two search warrants, one for his cellphone and one for his DNA.

“Immediately after the execution of those search warrants, Mr. Oakman was served with a warrant of arrest for a charge of sexual assault,” Swanton said.

Warrant returns indicate that DNA samples were taken from Oakman’s mouth and that investigators seized his cellphone, which was used twice to place calls to the alleged victim after Oakman learned he was under investigation.

The affidavit issued for the search warrant on April 13 says the alleged victim texted Oakman from a campus area nightclub where the two met and says he later made two attempts to contact her by phone after he became aware of the investigation.

The arrest warrant issued April 13 included the same sexual assault allegations against Oakman as the affidavit submitted for a search warrant on April 3 for Oakman's residence.