Green Bay Packers running back Josh Jacobs pleaded no contest Thursday to misdemeanor battery and misdemeanor criminal damage to property, closing the criminal case that has kept him off the field and now hands the next decision to the NFL.
Jacobs, 28, appeared in Brown County Circuit Court three days before Green Bay opens the season at Minnesota. Judge Marc A. Hammer convicted him on the battery count and fined him $1,000 plus court costs. On the property-damage count, the court accepted a deferred-judgment agreement. If Jacobs completes a year of conditions — no new crimes, no contact with the victim, supervision, counseling and restitution — that charge is scheduled to be dismissed after a follow-up hearing on Sept. 10, 2027.
“I fully understand the seriousness of the situation and I take full responsibility,” Jacobs told the court. He left without speaking to reporters. His attorneys said he already has started counseling.
A no-contest plea is not an admission of guilt. It is an agreement not to fight the charges. In practical terms, it produced a battery conviction and a year of court supervision. It also cleared the legal bottleneck the league has been waiting on.
The NFL, as of Thursday afternoon, had not changed Jacobs’ status. Spokesman Brian McCarthy said the matter remains under review of the personal conduct policy and that Jacobs “remains on the Commissioner’s Exempt list.” ESPN reported the league is likely to lift the exemption and replace it with a suspension. That is the difference between paid leave and unpaid discipline — and the difference between an unknown return date and a calendar the Packers can plan around.
That garage video is the piece of evidence that changed the charging picture. Police originally referred five offenses, including felony strangulation and suffocation and several domestic-abuse-enhanced misdemeanors. Prosecutors released Jacobs the next day, saying they needed more investigation. Forensic review of the home’s camera system was not completed until late July. On Aug. 27, the DA filed only two Class A misdemeanors — battery and criminal damage to property — and did not attach Wisconsin’s domestic-abuse enhancers. Jacobs’ lawyers emphasized that point at the time: the charges “do not include domestic violence.” A local report after Thursday’s hearing put it more bluntly: the case is not a domestic-violence case as defined by state law.
With Josh Jacobs pleading no contest to misdemeanor charges of battery and criminal damage to property, the NFL said there is “no timetable” as to when he could be disciplined. A league official said: We have been closely monitoring all developments in the matter which remains…
— Adam Schefter (@AdamSchefter) September 10, 2026
The person widely linked to Jacobs in the months before the arrest is social media personality Ashaley “Ash Kaashh” Taunsu, also styled Ash Kash or Ash Kassh. The two appeared together in vacation photos and videos from St. Barts and Cancun after the 2025 season. Jacobs posted a Snapchat clip of them holding hands on a beach in January. She posted pool photos of the pair. Tabloid and sports sites treated the relationship as public from that point on.
On the morning of May 23 — the same day police were called to Jacobs’ house — Kaashh posted on X: “‘Tough love’ sounds like cruelty to me.” The post circulated after his arrest. There is no official record tying that message to the Hobart call, and at least one outlet noted there was no verified confirmation she was the complainant. A later clip circulated online purporting to show her addressing the allegations; a Sportskeeda review found the audio did not match the captions attached to it.
Flip the pages for photos of Ash Kash.
