Fame does have disadvantages

Arrest publicity surprised Canes' Staal

RALEIGH -- Eric Staal knew his arrest probably would make the newspapers eventually. He never expected the kind of ink it garnered.

To wit: The full-page, front-page headline in the tabloid Toronto Sun reading "NHL Stars Gone Wild!" next to his mug shot and his younger brother Jordan's.

"That was frightening," the Carolina Hurricanes center said Wednesday in his first comments about his July 21 arrest. "I knew it would probably appear somewhere, sometime. I didn't think it would be blown up into that big of a deal.

"I don't know. I guess our name has been around a little bit the last couple years in hockey, so it turned into that."

Staal and his brother, who plays for the Pittsburgh Penguins, were among 14 people arrested and charged with disorderly conduct and obstructing the legal process during Staal's bachelor party in Lutsen, Minn.

He has agreed to plead guilty to a petty misdemeanor charge and pay a $587 fine, a bargain that will allow him to avoid jail time and will not jeopardize his immigration status. Staal said he hopes to finalize that deal before the Hurricanes' season opens Oct. 3.

The group was arrested after they were kicked out of the Lutsen Resort and Sea Villas for being too loud. The Cook County (Minn.) Sheriff's office said some group members were harassing passing motorists.

Staal, who was asleep when the group was evicted from the resort, ended up spending the night in jail less than a week before his Aug. 3 wedding in his hometown of Thunder Bay, Ontario -- about two hours away.

"It was just a bunch of guys who were loud, and we were in the wrong area to be loud. That was pretty much it," Staal said. "They told us to be quiet, we didn't really quiet down enough, and then they did what they did. It wasn't pleasant, but it is what it is now. ...

"It was one of those things that thankfully it wasn't more than what it was. It was all out there, and that was it. It was a mistake, an error in a little bit of judgment, but it happens and you learn from it."