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 Gopher justice Reports show officials helped athletes avoid prosecution
Posted: Friday May 21, 1999 07:17 PM
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) -- University of Minnesota athletics officials repeatedly intervened when athletes were accused of misconduct, often working out agreements that kept the cases from prosecutors, according to published reports. The Star Tribune documented accusations by 11 women, made from 1993 to 1997, of rape, assault, indecent conduct and harassment by seven football and basketball players. University officials became involved in at least six of the cases, the Star Tribune reported. Three of the athletes whose cases never went to prosecutors later were accused of assaulting other women, the newspaper reported, citing police reports, university documents, court records and interviews. The Saint Paul Pioneer Press also reported Friday on accusations by one of the women, tutor Rebecca Fabunmi, and the way they were handled by McKinley Boston, university vice president for student development and athletics. Friday's reports were the latest in a series of revelations about the university's athletic department since a former tutor, now of Danbury, Wis., alleged in March that she did coursework for several basketball players over several years. Outside attorneys are investigating that and other allegations. Fabunmi said a freshman football player masturbated in front of her during a tutoring session in 1995. She reported it first to then-football coach Jim Wacker and later to Boston. Fabunmi said Boston, who was then the men's athletics director, pressed her for details about what happened, asked if the player ejaculated and once made a motion with his own hand to simulate masturbation. She said Boston questioned whether the act really was masturbation and made her uncomfortable. When the player continued to harass the woman, she reported the problem to a campus detective, who talked with athletics officials but didn't write a report. On Thursday, Boston said he was sensitive and diplomatic in trying to help Fabunmi, but disagreed with her description of how the player acted. "I'm very confident that the complaint was dealt with in an appropriate manner," he told the Pioneer Press. On Friday, university President Mark Yudof said the school is committed to "fair and careful handling" of complaints of sexual misconduct. "If someone alleges anything from simple harassment to actual assault, the job of anyone in the system is to facilitate the complaint," he said. "No coverups, no whitewashes, no interferences with official investigations or any of that." Yudof said he has asked for a report by July 1 from Julie Sweitzer, director of the university's Office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action, and Don Lewis, one of the outside attorneys involved in investigating the athletic program. Sweitzer will meet with the women accusers if they are willing to do so, and advise them of their legal options, Yudof said. "To the extent the door was partially shut back then, we're opening it wide [now]," Yudof said. Among the other cases reported by the Star Tribune, athletics officials helped negotiate an agreement with a football player after a female athlete accused him of sexually assaulting her twice. To avoid criminal prosecution, the player signed an agreement to get counseling, though he denied any assault. But Wacker, who has since left Minnesota, said he didn't make him honor the agreement because he never believed the woman's accusation. Experts said such intervention by athletics officials and coaches, who have an interest in protecting players and keeping them eligible to play, compromises the criminal justice system and tells athletes they won't be held accountable. "There gets to be a mentality," said Laura Goodman-Brown, the state's ombudsman for crime victims. "'I'm a star athlete. I get what I want. And if you're what I want, you're what I get.' And if there are no repercussions for that behavior, what our system is telling them is, 'You're right. You can do that.'" Boston told the Star Tribune on Thursday that there should be a clear separation between police investigations and the athletic department's responsibility to discipline players. And he said he knew of no instances in which officials tried to protect players from the criminal process. In notes Fabunmi made about a meeting with Boston, the Star Tribune reported, she said she got the impression he had heard of other incidents involving the freshman football player. She wrote that Boston told her "that this is the young man's motif ... I said, 'So you mean other people know about his behavior and do nothing about it?' He said yes and went on to say that this is 1995 and people tend to look the other way." Experts said coaches and athletics officials shouldn't be involved in criminal cases, nor should police decide whether to forward a case to prosecutors for review. "It is not up to the police officer who is investigating the case to mediate," said Goodman-Brown, who reviews the criminal justice system when victims believe they've been mistreated by law enforcement agencies. "That is not his job. This is not a child who stole a piece of candy from the store."
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