In 2002, Banks, a high school football player in the United States, was accused of raping by Wanetta Gibson, a classmate at the Polytechnic High School. Facing a possible life sentence of 41 years, he accepted a plea bargain, including five years in prison, five years of strict parole, and registration as a sex offender. The Gibson family sued the Long Beach Unified School District, claiming that the district was corrupt and received $1.5 million in compensation in March 2011. Afterwards, Gibson contacted Banks and admitted that he had fabricated the incident. Banks secretly recorded the conversation, but Gibson refused to tell the prosecutor the facts and was unwilling to return the money. With the help of the California Innocence Project, Banks's wrongful conviction was reversed in May 2012. In April 2013, the Long Beach Unified School District sued Gibson for $2 million to repay the $1.5 million she had defrauded, and the school district eventually received $2.6 million in compensation. Banks briefly played for the Atlanta Falcons in 2013 and is currently a spokesperson for the California Innocence Project.