STEUBENVILLE, Ohio - The embattled football player at the center of a federal lawsuit and the quest to be on Youngstown State University's football team has won an appeal to have his name removed from the sex-offender registry. 

According to our NBC affiliate in Steubenville WTOV, a juvenile court judge has granted Richmond's request to be "declassified" and taken off the sex offender registry. 

Last month Richmond appealed to the court asking for the removal. 

Richmond served a year in a juvenile detention facility after he and another Steubenville High School football player were convicted in the 2012 rape of a 16-year-old-girl during a party.

Although Richmond enrolled at YSU as a student in 2016 and joined the football team in January 2017, the controversy didn't arise until media reports made that information public in August.

Richmond then filed the lawsuit Sept. 13 after Youngstown State University allowed him to join the football team and then told him he couldn't play this season.

A judge issued a temporary order the next day allowing Richmond to play until a Sept. 28 hearing on whether to make the order permanent.

Richmond played in the home game that following weekend.

Earlier this spring, YSU, and Richmond reached a settlement that would allow him to play on the team.