Alabama AD Greg Byrne addresses public perception of shielding Brandon Miller

In the wake of several new revelations in the case involving former Alabama basketball player Darius Miles and the murder of Jamea Jonae Harris, Alabama’s athletic department has come under fire.

One of the revelations that has drawn the most scrutiny was that star Alabama basketball player Brandon Miller was texted by Miles asking him to bring the gun that would later serve as the murder weapon to the scene.

Miller has continued playing for Alabama in the wake of the shooting, and he has not been charged in connection with the shooting.

Still, the recent revelation has caused some to accuse the Alabama basketball program and the athletics department of shielding Miller.

“I think that’s a fair narrative that people can immediately go to, and what I have tried to think about this entire time is let’s do what we think is right,” Alabama athletics director Greg Byrne said on the ESPN College GameDay podcast. “Let’s make sure we are honest, let’s make sure that we cooperate, that we support law enforcement and anybody else out there that needs to be supported through this. You can control what you can control.

“I can’t control whether somebody immediately goes to that as their thought on this.”

Byrne did attempt to explain why Alabama basketball has handled Miller the way it has.

“What I felt is that Brandon needed to be treated fairly like any other student-athlete should be that’s here at the University of Alabama, and that’s what’s been driving us through that, whether it was him or whether it was a student-athlete on any other team,” Byrne said.

“We have the information that we have today, and obviously we’re going to continue to cooperate with law enforcement and anybody else out there that needs to be a part of this. And if we gather new information down the road then we’ll deal with it at that time. But none of us have a crystal ball, completely. We need to be very respectful of what law enforcement is doing through this process. And we have been and we will continue to be in the future.”