The Pro Football Hall of Fame has listed convicted rapist Darren Sharper on its latest nomination list because he was nominated by at least one selector, a revelation that has drawn attention to the organization’s nominating process and which is unlikely to change, according to a Hall of Fame spokesman.
"We do have a committee that reviews the process every year, not just from that kind of question, but who can be elected, the number of selections we can have and how the system worked or if it could work better," Hall of Fame spokesman Joe Horrigan told the AP on Friday. "So I would anticipate this would always be part of the question. But I don't anticipate any groundswell (to change the rules) based on this one case."
There is no character clause in the bylaws, which are approved by the Hall of Fame’s board of directors, Horrigan told AP.
Sharper was also nominated last year before he pleaded guilty in a case in which he was accused of drugging and raping up to 16 women in four states, according to the AP. He was sentenced up to 18 years in prison last month.
His inclusion among the Hall of Fame nominees has sparked outrage on Twitter.
"Was Darren Sharper so great a player his achievements supersede his crimes?" Sporting News’ Mike DeCourcy wrote , blasting the nomination. "No one ever has been that great a player. No one ever will be."
O.J. Simpson, once tried for the double murder of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman in Los Angeles in 1994 and currently jailed in Nevada for conspiracy to commit armed robbery and kidnapping, is also still in the Pro Football Hall of Fame.
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