Friends Mourn High School Football Star

Rico Leroy Marshall’s friends and classmates at Forestville High School sought Tuesday to reconcile their memories of the former football star with his death early Saturday, which police attributed to a cocaine overdose.

The shock waves from Marshall’s death, which came a few hours after police questioned the 18-year-old at a notorious street drug market, swept through the Prince George’s County, Md., school as students returned to class after a three-day weekend.

Friends said Marshall’s lifestyle was not consistent with the stereotype of a person involved in the seductive and lucrative drug trade. They remembered him driving an old car. A girl he once went out with recalled that they split the cost of a movie date. His clothes, while fashionable, were hardly lavish.