The taxi driver knew he was in for a rough ride when the woman ran out of the bushes, jumped in next to him and screamed, "Lock the doors, lock the doors."

"So I locked the doors, and she said 'Go!' and as we are going, I just looked, just a glimpse, I saw this guy chasing the car! From my side!" Morten Karim Khani, 59, said Wednesday.

The man running after his cab was 6-foot-5 Broncos wide receiver Brandon Marshall, 23.

"All I knew was he was a huge black man chasing the car," said Khani, who drives a taxi part time and teaches calculus at the University of Colorado at Denver.

About an hour later that Monday night, Douglas County sheriff's deputies arrested Marshall at his apartment complex in the 8500 block of Gold Peak Lane in Highlands Ranch. They said he used a Dodge Charger to block Khani's taxi from leaving with his girlfriend, Jameelah L. Watley, who planned on catching a flight to her home in Georgia.

Marshall, who spent the night in jail, was in Douglas County court Wednesday to ask that his bond be modified to allow travel over the next few weeks to visit his mother in Florida and attend marketing functions.

The judge agreed to those conditions and set an April 18 pretrial conference for Marshall, who is charged with domestic violence and false imprisonment.

Khani remembers telling the deputies after his run-in with the football player that he should have stayed home with his wife.

"I said, 'He scared the s--- out of me, this guy,' " Khani said.

When Khani and Watley were talking to deputies at a toll booth on E-470, the taxi driver asked Watley how she knew the man who had chased her.

"She said, 'He plays football.' I said, 'For who?' She said, 'Broncos.' I said, 'What's his name?' She said, 'Brandon Marshall.' I said, 'I know that son of a b----,' " said Khani, a Broncos fan.

Khani's account of what happened agrees with the version of events Watley gave deputies.

Khani said Marshall twice used the Charger to block his taxi's path - once when he was trying to pull out of a driveway in the apartment complex, and again as he was leaving the premises.

Watley and Marshall both told deputies they had spent most of the evening arguing and that he had given her $80 for a cab, according to investigators' reports.

Marshall denied ever striking the cab, and told deputies he was only trying to get his wireless BlackBerry before Watley caught her flight to Georgia.

But Khani said Marshall punched the taxi.

"He jumped out of the car and attacked the (passenger-side) window, punching it, punching it six, seven times," Khani said. "I thought maybe he break the window, he's going to get in and drag her out."

Khani said he was finally able to navigate around Marshall's car.

morenoi@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-954-2895