In the Wake of Lawrence Phillips' Death, Family Decides to Donate Brain to CTE Research

Lawrence Phillips' family will have the Former Nebraska and NFL running back's brain donated to researchers at Boston University studying traumatic brain injury, according to Dan Chamberlain, an attorney of Phillips' family, reports USA Today. Phillips was recently found unresponsive at Kern Valley State Prison in Delano, California, where he was awaiting a trial that could have given him the death penalty. The death was ruled a suicide.

Chamberlain said that the hope in the decision is that it will provide the family with much wanted answers.

"[Phillips' mother] wanted an explanation about what happened, and I told her, 'Look, the only way you can really explain it is by examining his brain,'" Chamberlain told ESPN. "I told her, 'You owe it to you son, you owe it to every other NFL, college and pee wee and high school and middle school player that played football.'"

In 2008, Phillips was sentenced to more than 31 years in prison. He was accused of twice choking his girlfriend in 2005, and also of driving his car into 3 teens after a pickup football game in the Los Angeles area later that year, according to ESPN. In prison, he was accused of killing his cellmate, and the judge ruling that there was "sufficient cause to believe" he committed the murder, USA Today reported.

During his time at Nebraska, Phillips was instrumental in the Cornhuskers' national championship teams in 1994 and 1995. In 1996, he was drafted by the St. Louis Rams with the 6th overall pick. Unfortunately, he failed to realize his potential and was released by the organization the next year for insubordination. He also spent time with the Miami Dolphins and the San Francisco 49ers, but was out of the league after just three years.