Former N. Colorado punter guilty of assault, not attempted murder

"I was almost killed, and he got away with that," he said.

Mendoza said he knew the attempted-murder charge was a long shot, because there were no witnesses.

"Other than my testimony, it was going to be hard to prove it," he said.

His uncle, Dave Medina, said the Mendoza family gathered after the verdict and prayed for Cozad's family. His father, Rafael Mendoza Sr., said he felt sorry for Cozad's parents.

"They've got a son going to jail," he said.

The younger Mendoza said he and his family have forgiven Cozad.

"We can't have hate in (our) hearts," he said. "If you go through your life with hate in your heart, you're not a good person at all. I hope we can put this behind us."

Cozad was a junior walk-on when he joined Northern Colorado's football team last season after transferring from the University of Wyoming. Over the six days of testimony and arguments, prosecutors portrayed him as an ambitious but frustrated athlete who stabbed Mendoza because he couldn't outplay him on the field.

Cozad's new teammates and a female friend said he wanted badly to be the starter and was bitter when he was passed over. Northern Colorado coaches said Mendoza, also a junior last season, was unquestionably the better punter.

Gavaldon, who called only three witnesses, argued Cozad was a gentle and laid-back student who wouldn't resort to a knife attack.

Gavaldon told jurors it was Kevin Aussprung, a student living in the same dorm as Cozad, who stabbed Mendoza. After the verdict, Gavaldon said Aussprung declined to take a polygraph test.

Aussprung adamantly denied he was the attacker.

His attorney, Bill Crosier, said Aussprung wanted to take a polygraph but was angry and nervous over the suggestion that he might be the attacker -- feelings he thought might cause the machine to falsely indicate he was lying.

Crosier said he suggested Aussprung take the test another day, but "the operator didn't call me again."

Cozad's father, Richard Cozad, said his son's case had been exploited politically. He did not say by whom.

"We have a system of 'Observe the opportunity, evaluate the potential, exploit it to the fullest,"' the elder Cozad said. "It's not a system of justice, it's a system of politics."

Gavaldon said the charges against Cozad were too severe. "It's ridiculous ... very unfair," he said.

District Attorney Ken Buck disagreed. "Absolutely, positively not at all," he said.

Buck, a former college punter himself whose son is a freshman linebacker at Army, said the verdict sends a message that Americans take sports too seriously.

"The message is that it's never, ever appropriate to try to hurt somebody, first of all, and second of all, over something as stupid as starting on the football team," Buck said.

Mendoza agreed.

"I hope there's a message throughout the whole country that if you don't get the starting spot, if you're not good enough, you don't go to this length," he said. "You hit the weight room, you run, you practice, you do whatever you can to be better on the field. You don't try to take your teammate out. That's just not right."

Jury foreman Tim Scholfield read a statement on behalf of the panel saying the case was difficult.

"This has not been an easy decision for us to make, and none of us are happy about having reached the conclusion we did," he said. "We are all satisfied that with the information given this is the correct verdict."