Farm Owner Tells His Side of Taylor Story

The owner of a pecan farm near where Ramonce Taylor was arrested early Sunday on a drug charge spoke to the Austin American-Statesman. Rob Stewart said he was hosting a party for his daughter, who is graduating from Texas A&M, and that about 100 people had gathered for the event, which included a band, a fish fry and alcohol. Stewart said Taylor, who remains on scholarship at Texas pending the outcome of this case, had crashed the party with several friends. Stewart confronted the group after his son and several party guests complained to him that uninvited guests were trying to sell drugs. When Stewart encountered the uninvited guests, they were exchanging words and pushing and shoving with some partygoers. According to Stewart, as the group left, one of its members threatened to return with a firearm. That person was Taylor, according to a Bell County Sheriff's Department affidavit, which also stated that the backpack containing the marijuana that later resulted in Taylor's arrest was emblazoned with the words "Big 12 Conference." Taylor was released Monday on a $5,000 bond. ... Meanwhile, all of this activity has not gone unnoticed in Oklahoma, where a columnist says the Longhorns could be vulnerable without the playmaking Taylor. (some registration).