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Aaron Hernandez was worried about the safety of his fiancée and daughter when he came to Bill Belichick in February 2013 seeking a trade, the New England Patriots coach told authorities, according to documents obtained by The Boston Globe. Belichick told Massachusetts State Police and a North Attleborough police captain that Hernandez expressed concern that "people might potentially harm" Shayanna Jenkins and their daughter. In the meeting at the 2013 NFL scouting combine, Hernandez asked Belichick to have the Patriots trade him to a West Coast team or release him. Hernandez said he "was not concerned about his own safety because he had money," according to Belichick. The Globe obtained a police report recounting the meeting, as Belichick had requested the interview not be recorded. Belichick told police that he declined the requests to get him out of New England but offered to connect him with the Patriots' security chief. Hernandez denied that offer but did accept help in searching for a new place to live. The Hernandez-Belichick meeting came seven months after the shooting deaths of two men in Boston and a January 2013 incident in Florida in which Hernandez shot a friend who was with him at the Boston shooting. The trade request also was made four months before Odin Lloyd was shot and killed by Hernandez. Hernandez's agent, Brian Murphy, testified about his client's trade request to a grand jury in 2014, saying Hernandez wanted to get away from the Patriots because he thought he might be shot on the football field. At the combine meeting, Hernandez told Belichick that "he and his family would be a lot safer on the other side of the country," according to Murphy. Although Hernandez had expressed safety concerns, he ultimately chose to move to rent "the worst apartment with the least security" among several options, according to a Patriots staffer who relayed that point to Belichick. The then-Patriots tight end kept the apartment secret from Jenkins, and the Globe said it became known as his flophouse. Belichick told police that Hernandez said in May that he no longer had safety concerns. Belichick's comments give his side of a previously reported trade request from Hernandez. In 2013, Rolling Stone reported that Hernandez sought a trade. Hernandez's attorney Jose Baez also wrote about the trade request in a book released in August. "Coach Belichick wanted to make it very clear that he stands by what he told police investigators, 100%," Stacey James, the Patriots' vice president of media relations, told the Globe via email. The team did not respond further to requests for comment from Belichick or other team officials and players. Hernandez was found guilty of the murder of Lloyd in April 2015. The verdict was vacated in April 2017, after Hernandez killed himself in his prison cell while his case was pending appeal. A jury also found Hernandez not guilty of the Boston double homicide. The Globe's Spotlight division is releasing a six-part investigative series into Hernandez throughout the week. Previous parts detailed how Patriots teammates perceived the former football player and how Hernandez was sexually abused as a young boy growing up in Connecticut.
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