Written by Photo by Chris Unger/Zuffa LLC
Jon Jones’ legal saga over allegedly leaving the scene of an accident back in February took a strange twist with new charges being filed against him in New Mexico.
Online records and court officials confirmed to MMA Fighting that a second case was filed against Jones on June 30 with the same charge for leaving the scene of an accident, but this criminal complaint also featured a second charge for Use of Telephone to Terrify, Intimidate, Threaten, Harass, Annoy or Offend.
Based on the original police report filed from the incident that allegedly took place on Feb. 21, Jones was accused of leaving the scene of an accident after police responded to a car crash involving two vehicles. A woman was located in the front passenger seat “exhibiting signs of significant intoxication and lacking clothing from the waist down.”
The woman claimed Jones was driving her vehicle at the time of the accident and “subsequently fled the scene on foot.” She then placed a call to Jones and allowed a police service aide to speak to him. The police service aide claimed that Jones “appeared to be heavily intoxicated and made statements implying his capacity to employ lethal force through third parties.”
The police service aide requested backup, and Officer Andrew Romero responded to the scene and engaged in a separate conversation with Jones where similar “allusions to violence” were made, and the person on the phone evaded questions to confirm if it “was indeed Jon Jones.”
When police later contacted Jones, he claimed that the woman in question from the accident called him and handed the phone to an individual she identified as a police officer. Jones told police the person on the phone “immediately opened the conversation with unprofessional language” and that forced him to question the legitimacy of the caller’s claim to be involved with law enforcement.
Police eventually subpoenaed Jones’ call records and found that he called the woman involved with the car accident 13 times between 2:17 a.m. and 11:34 a.m. the next morning. Police also stated that there was a gap in Jones’ location based on his phone records from 11:51 p.m. until 2:11 a.m., which is when the accident took place.
As a result of the investigation, police filed a misdemeanor charge against Jones for leaving the scene of an accident, to which he already plead not guilty with a bench trial now scheduled for Aug. 14.
This new criminal complaint was filed by Officer Romero — the police officer who responded as backup to the scene of the accident and spoke to Jones on the phone — and this new case involved two separate charges for leaving the scene of an accident and use of a telephone to terrify, intimidate, threaten, harass, annoy or offend.
An arraignment hearing is currently scheduled for Aug. 4, but Jones’ attorney, Christopher Dodd, already filed a motion to dismiss on July 9 because of the duplicate charges involving the same case.
“Put simply, Mr. Jones is already facing prosecution in a separate case for the same factual allegations set forth in the criminal complaint in this matter, and it was wholly improper for this separate case to be filed,” Dodd wrote in his motion to the court. “The court should dismiss this case as it violates the mandatory joinder rule.
“The incidents at issue in both cases are one and the same. Mr. Jones now is forced to defend himself against two separate cases involves the exact same factual allegations. It is unknown why an [Albuquerque Police Department] detective and an [Albuquerque Police Department] officer who were both involved in the investigation of this case would not communicate and coordinate who would file charges but that seems to be what happened, unless the truth is that these law enforcement officers intentionally violated the same mandatory joinder rule for some improper strategic purpose., Either way, the result in the same, this case should be dismissed as Mr. Jones has been impermissibly charged twice for the same underlying incident.”
The case was assigned to Judge Brittany Maldonado, but she hasn’t ruled on the motion to dismiss yet. For now, the criminal complaint remains active.
Jones retired from the sport in June, and just hours later, the initial charge against him for allegedly leaving the scene of an accident was uncovered. Since then, Jones has already hinted at a comeback with the former heavyweight champion saying he was re-entering the UFC’s anti-doping program after President Donald Trump announced plans to hold a fight at the White House in 2026.