Sports In the Courts Blog : New York Attorneys & Lawyers Specializing in Sports Law & Legal Analysis

'Canes starting quarterback Jacory Harris and 11 other members of the football team have all been suspended and some have been ordered to pay restitution before being eligibile to play. The most serious penalties handed down by the NCAA were those individuals that took gifts from Mr. Shapiro while they were being recruited. These players include defensive lineman Olivier Vernon, who will sit out six games and pay $1,200,and Ray Ray Armstrong and tight end Dyron Dye who will miss four games apiece and pay $788 and $738, respectively. In addition to Harris, Sean Spence, Travis Benjamin, Marcus Forston and Adewale Ojomo, all projected as likely starters, must sit out one game and make restitution for accepting benefits after enrolling at the school.  Additionally, four other players must repay small amounts, all under $100, but will not miss any games. The only player cleared of any wrongdoing was Marcus Robinson. The NCAA is still continuing its investigation into the Miami scandal that has brought the dirty dealings of college athletics into the foreground. While the NCAA should be recognized for the swift decisions it has made regarding the student athletes, it has still put itself in a predicament regarding any future actions that must be taken in similar instances. The NCAA prides itself on its recognizing student athletes, however, in situations like this it should take a united front and disqualify student athletes for taking improper benefits or allow student athletes to get paid a specific sum during every season in which the student athlete is qualified to participate in the sport for which a scholarship was provided. A decision like this blurs the line between the goals of the NCAA and since these student athletes took improper benefits and were not suspended, this may be the beginning of the end of the term student athlete as we may see these athletes being paid in due time.  

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As of Friday the New York Jets and New York Football Giants (both residents of New Jersey) had moved their preseason game up to a 2 pm kickoff (from 7 pm) for last Saturday.

This would mean there could be tens of thousands of sitting ducks, a/k/a "fans", in the Meadowlands parking lot as Hurricane Irene was about to smack the tri-state area. Thankfully, NJ Governor Chris Christie has the common sense to put this to a stop. Christie called NFL Commissioner Goodell to put the game off until Monday to avert a potentially disastrous situation. Apparently, the Jets and Giants were more interested in selling beer and collecting parking fees to understand that they could be putting their fans in harm's way. Not to mention that there was no public transportation on Saturday from the game, but if you know the Meadowland's parking lot, then you understand its the windiest place on Earth with no protection from the elements.

You have to wonder what the Jets and Giants were thinking? Maybe they were trying to help their brand new stadium naming rights sponsor, MetLife, sell life insurance policies to fans as they ran for their lives on the way out? Hey, no physical required if you can sprint to your car. Maybe the wanted to punish the fans who refused to shell out $20,000 for a PSL?

Maybe they just didn't care.  

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Two LSU football players were suspended after being arrested for their alleged involvement in a brutal bar fight. Quarterback Jordan Jefferson and Linebacker Josh Johns were released on bail after being charged with second degree felony battery.

Last Friday, Jefferson and Jones were part of a brawl that injured 4, including a victim who was allegedly kicked in the face by both Jefferson and Jones.  According to the police report, the fight started when one of the victims asked (or possibly yelled at) a group of 10-15 LSU players to move a vehicle which was blocking the victim's vehicle. The players then pulled the victim out of his pickup and began beating him. Another victim attempted to help and was beaten as well.

Yet another black eye for college sports. LSU's arm had to be twisted to suspend Jefferson with the game against rival Oregon looming. Instead of displaying better judgment (of course, the allegations still must be proven) and preparing for LSU's opener, Jefferson and Jones now await indictment by a grand jury.

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As of late Thursday night, Miami concluded its internal investigation into the allegations of improper benefits received by current members of the Hurricanes through their association with Nevin Shapiro. After concluding its investigation, Miami began the process of ruling some members of its football team ineligible and will begin the reinstatement process. While Coach Golden would not disclose the names or the amount of the players which have been ruled ineligible, according to ESPN, up to 13 players have been ruled ineligible. Most notably, senior, starting quartberack Jacory Harris among numerous other current Hurricanes named in the Yahoo! Sports story is believed to have been ruled ineligible by the school. Now that Miami has concluded its own investigation and declared certain players ineligible, it is up to the NCAA to reinstate these players, and for Miami's sake, hopefully before its opener on September 5th. According to Coach Golden, being declared ineligible does not necessarily mean that any of the Hurricanes will miss anytime, this season. For now, all of the ineligible players are allowed to practice and participate in team activities, excluding games, until the NCAA rules on the athletes eligibility.

According to the NCAA's website, once a school discovers a student-athlete has been involved in a violation, it must declare the student-athlete ineligible, investigate the violation, and forward its report with a request for the student-athlete’s eligibility to be reinstated to the NCAA. Upon receipt of a request for reinstatement, the NCAA student-athlete reinstatement staff, acting upon authority granted by the NCAA Comittee on Student-Athlete Reinstatement, makes the initial decision regarding reinstatement of a student-athlete’s eligibility. In order to determine the potential reinstatement, the Reinstatement Staff reviews various factors which include: 1) the nature and seriousness of the violation; 2) any impermissible benefits received by the student-athlete; 3) the student-athlete’s level of responsibility; 4) any mitigating factors presented by the school; 5) applicable NCAA guidelines; and 6) any relevant case precedent. The Reinstatement Staff's decision can come in the form of three possible results, 1) unconditional reinstatement; 2) reinstatement with conditions; and 3) remain ineligibile and not be reinstated. According to the NCAA, the third result is extremely rare. While the NCAA notes that most cases are normally resolved in one week from the date the school submits its documentation, there is no timeline for extreme circumstances. In this case, the NCAA will have a difficult task of sifting through all the documentation submitted to determine whether these Hurricanes violated the amateruism rules for taking improper benefits and the nature and extent of the benefits taken. While all cases should be handled based on the circumstances of the individual case, the NCAA may take this opportunity to send a strong message and try to curtail the rampant and excessive issues that have plagued amateur athletics for nearly three academic years. Kickoff is just 11 days away and a lot can happen to these players in that time. Here is hoping that Coach Golden has multiple depth charts which he can put into place in the event that numerous starts are ruled ineligible for the opener.

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With the lockout situation resolved and opening day just a few weeks away, the NFL avoided disaster. However, lawsuits have been filed by former players against the league, claiming that the NFL intentionally withheld information concerning the effects of concussions from the players. The first lawsuit that seeks certification as a class action, filed in Philadelphia federal court last week, claims that the NFL taught the players to tackle with their heads, while knowing that such hits could cause serious neurological damage. A copy of the Complaint can be seen here.

These lawsuits will be difficult for the players to win. For starters, many retired players already receive benefits through the league's "88" plan and are subject to the collective bargaining agreement. The agreement should have been drafted to preclude additional claims such as those brought in the lawsuits. The NFL can also assert that the players assumed the risk that they would suffer head injuries, as football is a violent sport.

Notwithstanding the merits, class action lawsuits are expensive to defend, and given the bad press the NFL has received for its treatment of retired players, the NFL should seriously consider settling these lawsuits, and provide greater medical care for the retired players.  

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In yet another act of senseless violence, a 24 year old man was shot in the parking lot of Candlestick Park, following a meaningless preseason game between the San Francisco 49ers and Oakland Raiders. To be fair, it is not exactly clear why the fight occurred, but this happened on the heels of the Brian Stow incident, and the victim was wearing a shirt that read "F--- the Niners." The victim is hospitalized in critical condition, and there was another, separate shooting victim with less serious injuries. A third person was also beaten unconscious in a bathroom during the game.

Regardless of what caused the fights and shootings, professional sports teams have a responsibility to provide "adequate security." What is adequate depends upon the nature of the event (for example, games between rivals should have more security than usual), the extent of prior incidents at the venue, and the physical layout and number of attendees, among other factors. Of course, security guards are not typically expected to confront armed persons. However, a security presence can deter criminal activity and suppress fights before they escalate.

The 49ers have already declared that tailgating after kickoff will be banned. There are also reports that the NFL will stop the annual Raiders-49ers preseason game. Unfortunately, it only takes a small percentage of fans to ruin the experience for everyone else. Hopefully the Candlestick victims make full recoveries, and we stop reading about these vicious assaults. 

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In light of the recent USC, Ohio State, Miami, Reggie Bush, Terrelle Pryor, Auburn's Cam Newton (to just get started) controversies and scandals, the NCAA President Mark Emmert is now seeking "serious and fundamental change." Well, good for him, now that there is smoke, fire and a raging media inferno in college sports.

You can imagine the pride of the parents who trusted schools like the University of Miami with their young sons who were, in turn, handed over to criminals like Nevin Shapiro. All Mr. Shapiro, a convicted Ponzi scheme felon, did was hook up the underage student-athletes with cash, booze and illegal prostitution. This doesn't exactly sound like college math or English.

So here come the usual calls for reform and "fundamental change" right on cue. So what can be done to save the NCAA from looking like an absentee landlord while money-pushing boosters and improper agents are crawling through its college sports?

The first thing the NCAA needs to do is stop this fraud of a "scholar-athlete" at the highest level of its sports. Maybe I am being too broad here but these major college sports schools are nothing more than a feeding system for the professional leagues. We can no longer pretend that money should not be involved. Too many college students are sent to school in near poverty to play for major universities that sell jerseys bearing the students' names. The students get nothing from college merchandise and TV deals and there is the problem.

The NCAA needs formulate a financial stipend to paid to all players at the Division 1 level. There I said it, college athletes need to be paid to follow the rules. The stipend should be a flat sum for everyone in the sport (i.e. each Division 1 football player gets $25,000 a year).

Now there has been a lot of talk about Miami getting the "death penalty" of no TV, no scholarships and no bowls for its sins. This type of NCAA capital punishment will not work without a corresponding "death penalty" for players (so to speak of course). The type of fundamental change is really not that complicated. If Shapiro gave illegal gifts to players, then the players knowingly took cash, cars, booze, prostitutes and maybe even worse. If a college player commits a major rule violation of this type, then that should be the end of his or her college sports career.

It is obvious (painfully so), that the penalty must be so awful for the players that they would never violate the rules. Those players who knowingly take extra cash, jewelry and commit crimes, have no business in the NCAA and college sports is better to be rid of them.

If you want fundamental change then be willing to take a serious stand. 

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Ever since “the Death Penalty” was introduced in the lexicon of college sports fan at the time of the SMU football debacle in 1986, the term has been thrown around whenever a NCAA member institution appears to be charting a course of rampant misbehavior bordering on lack of institutional control, however, no major college has been given the Death Penalty since SMU, however, that may change starting now. By now most people have already heard about the Yahoo! Sports Investigative Report wherein former University of Miami booster and convicted felon Nevin Shaprio informed Yahoo! Sports over the course of 100 hours of jailhouse interviews that he provided improper benefits to 72 players, although Yahoo! confirmed it was 73 players, seven coaches and three support staff members, who he said either received illicit benefits, witnessed the booster giving them, or played some role in his improper activity.

Beginning in 2002 and concluding in 2010, Shapiro said he had an eight-year run of rampant NCAA rule-breaking, some of it with the knowledge or direct participation of at least seven coaches from the Miami football and basketball programs. Shapiro said that the benefits to athletes included cash, prostitutes, entertainment in his multimillion-dollar homes and yacht, paid trips to high-end restaurants and nightclubs, jewelry, bounties for on-field play (including bounties for injuring opposing players), travel and, on one occasion, an abortion. According to the Yahoo! Sports report, Shapiro’s actions would potentially breach multiple parts of at least four major NCAA bylaws, and possibly many more. Shapiro actions may have violated multiple parts of bylaw 11, involving impermissible compensation to coaches; multiple parts of bylaw 12, involving amateurism of athletes; multiple parts of bylaw 13, involving improper recruiting activity; and multiple parts of bylaw 16, involving extra benefits to athletes. Based on Shapiro’s allegations, the NCAA is undertaking its own investigation and may levy the dreaded Death Penalty on The U.

The Death Penalty rule stipulates that if a second major violation occurs at any institution within five years of being on probation in the same sport or another sport, that institution can be barred from competing in the sport involved in the second violation for either one or two seasons. In cases of particularly egregious misconduct, a school can also be stripped of its right to vote at NCAA conventions for four years. The NCAA Infractions Committee will need to independently corroborated the alleged violations through sources other than a convicted felon before even considering the Death Penalty. The Death Penalty would be a horrendous blow to a storied program such as The U, however, the NCAA may need to set an example for its member institutions as it seems that many of the major football programs have been implicated in the past 18 months. Including Miami, one-quarter of the ACC has been embattled by football violations, and one-half of the ACC’s Coastal Division (Miami, UNC, and Georgia Tech) has been implicated in scandals. Additionally, Southern California, Ohio State, Auburn, Oregon, Michigan, and LSU, many of the who’s who of college football, have all been investigated or sanctioned within the past 18 months. The only way this systematic problem may be resolved is through the Death Penalty for a program that is no stranger to sanctions. Just when a new football coach (Al Golden), basketball coach (Jim Laranaga), and AD (Shawn Eichorst) were brought into the fold, The U might fall on some hard times. For now Miami has to prepare for its opening game on national TV, September 5th at the University of Maryland, by then Miami might now have much of a team. Stay tuned because this game is far from over.

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The Chicago Cubs have moved to place troubled pitcher Carlos Zambrano on their player "disqualified list." This means that Zambrano must stay away from the team and will not be paid for 30 days.

As has been widely reported, Zambrano unraveled on the mound and threw at Chipper Jones. Zambrano then was ejected from the game, cleaned out his locker and left the stadium without permission. Not surprisingly the team described Zambrano's conduct as "intolerable."

Now, we know how these things work in baseball. The team takes disciplinary action and the "players" file a grievance before the ink is dry But what if the "players" think the team was right in its action?

The Cubs' Alfonso Soriano described the $91 million pitcher as "mentally weak." Ryan Dempster said that Zambrano has made his bed and he would probably never pitch for the Cubs again. Other Cubs felt that Zambrano had quit on them.

The question for the Players' Association is whether it defends Zambrano or looks at the whole situation and agrees that the team and its players were right? Zambrano quit on his team, will his Union quit on him? 

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University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee PG Kaylon Williams was arrested and charged with DUI early Wednesday morning. Williams' blood alcohol content was allegedly a staggering .228, about three times the legal limit in Iowa.

A police officer noticed that Williams' vehicle did not have a front license plate, and that is all a police officer needs to pull you over, especially at 1:40 a.m. when drunk drivers are sitting ducks. Williams initially pulled over, but then deciding to make matters worse, he drove away and got out of his car (without putting it in park), attempting to run away from the police. He was caught shortly thereafter by a K-9.

Williams now faces serious charges in addition to the DUI, as well as a likely suspension from the University.

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