Lee Dort arrested on charges of aggravated assault, strangulation, per report

Disturbing news came out of Nashville on Sunday as Tennessean reporter Aria Gerson reported that Vanderbilt forward Lee Dort was arrested late Sunday morning.

According to Gerson, Dort was arrested on a felony charge of aggravated assault by strangulation following a disturbance from his ex-girlfriend’s university dorm room.

A call was made to Vanderbilt police at 1:14 a.m. on Sunday reporting screams heard from Dort’s ex-girlfriend’s dorm room at McTyeire Hall on Vanderbilt’s campus. She told police that Dort had taken her phone and pushed her against the wall and bedpost inside of her dorm room, followed by him holding her against the bedpost, saying she said she slid down on the bed and he gripped her neck.

The ex-girlfriend also had a scratch on her shoulder and a red mark on her arm when officers investigated per Gerson’s report which referenced an arrest affidavit acquired by The Tennessean.

“We are aware of the matter and have suspended student-athlete Lee Dort from the basketball team pending the outcomes of the university’s and the legal system’s processes,” Vanderbilt spokesman Jacob Bell said in a university statement.

After having his Miranda Rights read to him and being questioned at Memorial Stadium where the Commodores play their home basketball games, Dort was booked into the Davidson County Jail Sunday morning at 5:40 a.m. before being released on a $10,000 bond roughly 10 hours later on Sunday afternoon.

Dort was a four-star high school prospect out of Greenhill School in Addison Texas, where he was rated the No. 13 center in the nation and the No. 100 overall recruit in the 2022 class according to On3’s Industry Ranking, a weighted average that utilizes all four major recruiting media companies.

He’s in the midst of his second season at Vanderbilt, appearing in 17 games last season where he averaged 1.7 points and 2.1 rebounds per game. This year he’s only appeared in one game for the Commodores, grabbing two rebounds and scoring one point in the game from the free-throw line in the team’s 84-78 loss to NC State in the Vegas Showdown.

Dort missed the first four games of the season this year due to a foot injury, and did not log any minutes in Vanderbilt’s most recent matchup with Arizona State last Friday when they fell to the Sun Devils 82-67.