Shortly after 9 p.m. on March 4, Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger turned to Heath Burton and told the restaurant owner that he was going to do something he'd never done before: Drive to tiny Milledgeville.
"He told me he'd never been down there," said Burton, owner of the posh Eenoco Japanese Steak & Sushi restaurant a few miles from Roethlisberger's mansion in the Reynolds Plantation resort.
After a 45-minute drive to the home of Georgia College & State University, Roethlisberger indulged in a few hours of bar hopping -- complete with Big Ben holding court in the VIP room of the popular Capital City nightclub. The fun ended soon after a 20-year-old woman told a Milledgeville patrolman at 2:30 a.m. March 5 that Roethlisberger, 28, had sexually assaulted her there.
The ongoing criminal investigation into Roethlisberger's conduct that night and a flood of national media washing over the seat of Baldwin County are revealing in greater detail the cloistered world of a National Football League icon known not only for his two Super Bowl rings, but also two allegations of sexual assault. Continue
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