Indiana police responded to an emergency call last month for a suspected overdose at the home of Indianapolis Colts owner Jim Irsay, FOX59 reports.
According to records obtained by an Indianapolis television station, police responded to the Carmel, Indiana, residence at 4:30 a.m. on Dec. 8 and found Ursay unconscious and having trouble breathing.
“At this time, it is unknown what Mr. Irsay consumed prior to our arrival,” an officer wrote in the report, which listed medications prescribed to Irsay.
According to the report, the measures taken by police to revive Irsay, 64, included the use of a medication used to reverse an opioid overdose.
On January 9, the Colts issued a statement saying Ursay was being treated for a serious respiratory illness.
The team repeated that information Wednesday.
“Mr. Ursay is recovering from his respiratory illness,” a statement from the Colts said. “We will not be commenting further on his personal health and continue to ask that the privacy of Jim and his family be respected.”
Ursay revealed during a November 2023 interview with Bryant Gumbel on HBO’s Real Sports that he had struggled with drug addiction and had nearly died from a previous overdose. He mentioned attending rehabilitation “no fewer than 15 occasions.”
Ursay made more headlines in the same interview when she claimed that his arrest for drunk driving in March 2014 was the result of prejudice against him for being white and rich.
“I’m biased because I’m a rich, white billionaire,” Ursay told HBO’s Andrea Kramer. “If I’m the average guy on the block, I’m not getting into that at all.”
When asked what he thought it was like for a white billionaire to claim that he was biased, Urse kept his comments to himself.
“I’m indifferent to its appearance,” Ursay asserted. “It’s the reality… I have no concern for people’s opinions on its aesthetics or sound.” The truth is the truth, and I know the truth.”
Police in Carmel, an Indianapolis suburb, stopped Ursay after seeing a man driving slowly in a Toyota Highlander, not stopping on the road and using a turn signal. Officers found several prescription medications in Irsay’s vehicle along with more than $29,000 in cash.
A toxicology report showed that Ursay had the painkillers oxycodone and hydrocodone in his system at the time of his arrest, as well as alprazolam, which is used to treat anxiety. Officers at the scene said he had trouble reading the alphabet and had also failed other field sobriety tests.
The NFL suspended Irsay for his team’s first six games the following season and fined him $500,000.
Irsay’s father, Robert Irsay, made his fortune through a series of heating and air conditioning companies before purchasing the Baltimore Colts and controversially moving the team to Indiana in 1984.
Jim Irsay has owned the Colts since 1997, when he won a legal battle with his stepmother over ownership of the team after his father’s death.