Deion Sanders' son Shilo goes to trial this week. Why this case is so weird
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The bankruptcy trial of Deion Sanders’ son Shilo is starting in downtown Denver on Monday, Aug. 31, and will spend up to five days examining what Shilo Sanders did or didn’t do at age 15 at a very specific time and place – his school in Dallas on Sept. 17, 2015.
More than $11 million is at stake in this trial. Deion Sanders, Colorado’s football coach, might even be called as a witness the day after his team plays at Georgia Tech on Sept. 3.
Here’s what to know about a case that is 11 years in the making and recently had four lawyers representing Shilo Sanders at a pretrial hearing.
Why is this case so weird?
“Trials are rare in bankruptcy court,” said Alex Hernandez, an attorney and bankruptcy expert in Florida.
And this case isn’t just going to trial. It’s going to trial about an incident from 11 years ago.
Other disputes with millions of dollars at stake often settle out of court to reduce the risk for each side. By contrast, the Sanders family has shown no indication it wanted to compromise and is risking more than $11 million by taking this all the way to trial.
Even stranger is the fact there already was a trial about this incident, in Dallas in 2022. But Shilo Sanders didn’t show up for it and is getting a chance to escape the consequences of that trial now in bankruptcy court.
What is the point of this trial?
Shilo Sanders, a former Colorado safety, is trying to get out of more than $11 million in debt. That’s why he filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy in October 2023. Almost all of that debt is owed to a security guard at his former school in Dallas, John Darjean, who sued Shilo Sanders in Dallas in 2016. Darjean accused him of assaulting him and permanently injuring him that day in 2015 when he tried to confiscate his phone at school at Deion Sanders’ request.
That case went to trial in Dallas in 2022, when Darjean presented his case to a judge and won a $11.89 million default judgment against Sanders after Sanders failed to attend the proceeding.
But then when Darjean moved to collect on that debt in 2023, Sanders filed for bankruptcy to get out of it. In response, Darjean is fighting Sanders’ attempt to discharge the judgment he’s owed in bankruptcy court. He wants to collect all of it.
How could Shilo Sanders be allowed to get out of the debt?
Generally, debtors can get out of certain debts by filing for bankruptcy. But there are specific exceptions to that under section 523 of bankruptcy law. One of those exceptions is if the debt stems from a “willful and malicious injury.”
The judge who presided over the trial in 2022 case found “Shilo Sanders did in fact cause physical harm and injuries to John Darjean by assaulting him” that day, according to her final judgment.
But the words “willful and malicious” were not part of her findings.
So this new trial in bankruptcy court is about whether the debt did in fact stem from a willful and malicious injury. If the bankruptcy judge finds it did, Shilo will remain on the hook for the judgment debt.
Shilo Sanders’ legal team will argue he acted in self-defense, not with malicious intent, and therefore should be allowed to discharge the debt.
Sanders, now 26, “contends that his actions were justified in that any force used by (Sanders) was reasonable and immediately necessary to protect himself against (Darjean’s) own use or attempted use of improper force,” said a pretrial statement filed by the parties in the case.
How will that be determined?
This is a bench trial to be decided by a judge, Michael E. Romero, not a jury. He will hear evidence that relates to Shilo Sanders’ state of mind that day to answer that question. Was he in fear for his safety? Or was he lashing out maliciously? Much of the evidence will come from videos of previous testimony in Darjean’s Texas lawsuit.
“I’ll bring the popcorn; there’s going to be a lot of videos,” Darjean’s attorney, Ori Raphael told the judge in July.
What is Deion Sanders’ role in this?
He spoke with Darjean by phone that day and told Darjean to take his son’s phone because he didn’t want him talking to his mother. Deion Sanders initially believed Darjean’s version of events before changing his mind, according to court records.
A larger question persists about why Deion Sanders also allowed his son to drop his attorneys in 2020, when Shilo Sanders was 20. Shilo Sanders went without an attorney from then until 2023, after the trial was over. If Shilo Sanders had kept an attorney during that time, he wouldn’t have missed the trial and could have avoided this worst-case outcome by defending himself or settling for a much smaller amount.
Will Deion Sanders testify?
Maybe. The judge ruled he must be available to testify at 1:30 p.m. MT on Sept. 4, if necessary. He will testify only during the rebuttal phase of the trial if Shilo Sanders’ attorneys bring up topics that “open the door” for Darjean’s attorney to call the father as a witness.
“Deion shouldn’t have to testify in this situation, and I don’t think he will,” said Sanders’ attorney, Harvey Steinberg.
What happens if Shilo Sanders wins this trial?
He will clear a major hurdle toward discharging the debt. This trial is the biggest threat to that objective. But he won’t be totally out of the woods if he wins. He is facing a separate complaint from Darjean that alleges he also should be denied a discharge of his debt because he improperly concealed or omitted assets when filing for bankruptcy. That case was put on hold for this trial and appears to be much more of a longshot to win.
The bankruptcy trustee who is overseeing the bankruptcy estate for Sanders’ creditors also has a pending complaint against Shilo Sanders that hasn’t been resolved and could go to trial, too.
The trustee is in charge of rounding up Sanders’ non-exempt assets to divide among creditors. In November 2024, Sanders’ attorney told the judge Sanders had turned over about $210,000 to the bankruptcy estate — a mere fraction of what he owes.
What happens if Shilo Sanders loses this trial?
He will remain on the hook for the judgment and Darjean could pursue debt-collection efforts against him. That won’t be easy, either. Debt collection of that magnitude can be a long-running cat-and-mouse game if the debtor doesn’t cooperate. For example, former NFL star running back Adrian Peterson has been accused of evading efforts to collect on an $8.3 million court judgment against him from 2021.
Is there video of the incident from 2015?
Yes, but it’s inconclusive because it only shows part of the incident. It was published on TMZ in 2016. Darjean has accused Deion Sanders of arranging to delete video footage that showed more conclusive proof about what happened.
Shilo Sanders’ attorney, Victor Vital, said he wasn’t sure if this other footage ever existed.
This other footage has never been found, but the judge said Aug. 14 that he would allow testimony from those who said they saw it.
What is Shilo Sanders doing now?
He released a new rap album Aug. 30 that features 13 songs, the first of which is called "Go out Swinging." It's not believed to be a reference to 2015 incident. Shilo Sanders is the third of Deion Sanders’s five children with two former wives and is the older brother of Cleveland Browns quarterback Shedeur Sanders. He finished his college football career at Colorado in 2024 and got waived by the Tampa Bay Buccaneers before the season in 2025.
What is John Darjean doing now?
Darjean, 50, is a former minor-league outfielder who played in the New York Yankees organization, He has been living in the Dominican Republic after having another spinal surgery in May — an injury he attributed to the incident in 2015. Darjean claims Sanders punched him and swung a roundhouse elbow into his upper chest that day, aggravating a previous neck injury that put him in the hospital immediately after the incident He also said he suffers from incontinence and nerve damage as a result of what happened.
Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Deion Sanders' son Shilo goes to trial this week. Why this case is so weird
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