Justin Fashanu

Justinus Soni "Justin" Fashanu ( FASH-ə-noo; 19 February 1961 – 2 May 1998) was an English footballer who played for a variety of clubs between 1978 and 1997. He was known by his early clubs to be gay, and came out publicly later in his career, becoming the first professional footballer to be openly gay. He was also one of the first footballers to command a £1 million transfer fee, with his transfer from Norwich City to Nottingham Forest in 1981, and had varying levels of success as a player afterwards, until he retired in 1997.

After moving to the United States, in 1998 he was questioned by police when a seventeen-year-old boy accused him of sexual assault. He was charged, and a warrant for his arrest was issued in Howard County, Maryland, on 3 April 1998, but he had already left his flat. According to his suicide note, fearing he would not get a fair trial because of his homosexuality, he fled to England, where he killed himself in London in May 1998. His suicide note stated that the sex was consensual. In 2020, Fashanu was inducted into the National Football Museum Hall of Fame.