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 No contest UCLA players go to court for handicap parking scam
Posted: Thursday July 29, 1999 06:28 PM
LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Disabled activists booed outside as nine UCLA football players apologized in court for using handicapped permits to get better parking spots around campus. "We did not realize the seriousness of our actions," linebacker Ali Abdul Azziz said outside court after nine of 14 Bruins charged in the case entered pleas. Five more current and former members of the team face arraignment Aug. 25. Craig Walendy, one of the players, was at the San Francisco 49ers training camps. "Our faces have been posted on television and newspapers and we know we have embarrassed our school, our families and ourselves," Azziz said. "We realize we exercised bad judgment and we're anxious to make amends for what we've done." Seven players who entered pleas on Wednesday and two who are to be arraigned next month are still with the team and will be suspended for two games next season, the school said. Six of the players are starters. "This behavior is particularly insensitive because it was carried out by student athletes, for they are among the most able-bodied of all," UCLA Chancellor Albert Carnesale said. The players pleaded no contest to illegally possessing state-issued handicapped placards. Each was placed on 24 months probation, must pay fines, penalties and restitution amounting to about $1,500, and complete 200 hours of community service. Half the community service will be with the Special Olympics, which holds athletic games for the disabled. The other 100 hours were assigned to the city parks department or groups helping those with cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis and other disabilities. The athletes also must spend a day meeting and talking with the disabled and their advocates, assistant city attorney Brian Williams said. In exchange for their pleas, the prosecutor dropped a second count of giving false information to the California Department of Motor Vehicles. Outside court, the players were booed and harangued by about a dozen disabled activists in wheelchairs. Some held flyers with the Bruins football logo that read 'Park them on the bench.' "They were treated with kid gloves," said Lillibeth Navarro of the California Foundation of Independent Living Centers. "I feel that they were given light sentences because they're athletes." The punishment is fair, prosecutor Williams said, and sends a "strong signal." If the players apply for a job and are asked if they ever have been arrested or convicted of a crime, they must say yes, he noted. "That'll follow them the rest of their lives," he said. "They've been punished not only adequately but more than the average citizen," said Harland Braun, a lawyer who represented several of the athletes. Prosecutors said the players submitted bogus applications to the DMV for the placards, which allowed them to park at metered zones for free and in spots reserved for the disabled. The applications listed complaints ranging from knee injuries to Bell's palsy and included the signatures of nonexistent physicians. "These athletes made a mistake, and every one of them have told me that and have said that to everyone within hearing distance of them," said Rafer Johnson, the 1960 Olympic decathlon champion and a Special Olympics board member who was at the courthouse. Coach Bob Toledo told a campus press conference he was "terribly disappointed in the players and what they did." "It's like your children," he said. "I'm a surrogate father. I've got to scold them, I've got to discipline them, but I'm still going to love them. Unfortunately, this is going to be a pretty good chunk of our football team."
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