Editors’ note: This story contains accounts of domestic violence. If you or someone you know is a survivor of domestic abuse, contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or at https://www.thehotline.org/
The felony assault charge against former Nebraska interim coach Mickey Joseph was dropped Wednesday after the woman who said she was assaulted by Joseph declined to testify.
Joseph was initially charged with assault by strangulation or suffocation in connection with a November domestic disturbance at his home where he and his wife, Priscilla Joseph, lived. During the preliminary hearing Wednesday, prosecutor Erica Pruess told Lancaster County Judge Laurie Yardley that the woman, whose name has not been made public, emailed her to say she wouldn’t testify.
According to the Associated Press, Pruess said authorities attempted to serve a summons in Arizona, where the woman now lives, to require her to appear but were unsuccessful.
On Nov. 30, police went to Joseph’s Lincoln residence after a domestic disturbance and arrested Joseph on site. The woman told police she and Joseph were in an argument when Joseph pushed her onto a couch and then he got on top of her and grabbed her throat. She said she was unable to breathe until she pushed him off.
She then went into the kitchen where Joseph grabbed her hair from behind and pulled her backward, causing her to fall to the floor. While falling, she said Joseph struck her in the left temple with a closed fist.
Police said the woman had redness and swelling around her left eye and she had several strands of hair clinging to her upper pant leg. She said the hairs were pulled from her when Joseph grabbed her.
Two weeks after Joseph was charged, his wife asked for a legal separation in Lancaster County Court. Nebraska parted ways with Joseph in December.
