Cameron Sutton was in the Detroit Lions' workout facility last week when the team found out about the warrant for his arrest, team president Rod Wood said Monday.
Wood, speaking from the NFL's league meetings in Orlando, Florida, told Fox 2 in Detroit that a member of the team was able to talk with Sutton and advise him to turn himself in. The Lions released Sutton the next day.
"Suggested he get counsel and do the right thing to turn himself in," Wood told the television station. "After that, we met the rest of the day and the following morning to decide to release him."
Wood said Sutton "just kinda showed up unexpectedly to work out. We were able to talk to him in person -- not me, but other members of the staff -- and he left the building. We released him the next day, and no one has spoken to him since."
The Hillsborough County Sheriff's Office made their warrant for Sutton public last week as authorities have been unable to locate Sutton since March 7, when the arrest warrant was issued. Sutton is facing a charge of domestic battery by strangulation, a third-degree felony punishable by up to five years in prison.
Sutton, 29, joined the Lions as an unrestricted free agent last year on a three-year, $33 million contract after spending his first six NFL seasons with the Pittsburgh Steelers. Wood told Fox 2 that, "it was a difficult decision" to release Sutton, "but it was the right decision."
"We're just moving on. I want to make sure everybody knows, we didn't release him because of anything related to the cap or money that we may owe him. It was the right thing to do for the organization.
"We did release him with a post-June 1 designation, which will allow us to deal with whatever the cap implications are over two seasons versus one. And we're going to let the process between us, him and the union play out to determine exactly what happens. But money was not on my mind when we made our decisions."