OTL Report: Lawyers, status, public backlash aid college athletes accused of crimes

[NDdomer2]

Outside the Lines: College athletes at major programs benefit from confluence of factors to sometimes avoid criminal charges

How Outside the Lines completed its athletes-police investigation at 10 schools

College Football Nation Blog - ESPN

 

[IrishLax]

So this was the slam piece that they were trying to get records from Notre Dame for.

This is the blurb on Notre Dame:

The exact opposite happened in 2010 at the University of Notre Dame, in one of the school's most notorious cases involving an allegation against a member of the football team.

Lizzy Seeberg, a student at neighboring St. Mary's College, told police that she had been sexually assaulted by a football player. But police didn't interview him until two weeks after Seeberg reported the incident -- and five days after Seeberg had committed suicide. Police initially indicated they couldn't find the athlete, according to her father, Tom Seeberg, even though there was a home football game just three days after the incident was reported.

That Tom Seeberg said police could not find the athlete on campus or at practice didn't surprise former Notre Dame police officer Pat Cottrell, who said a university policy prevented campus police from approaching athletes at any athletic facility. Further, the university would not allow anyone on the athletic staff to be contacted for help in finding a player, he said.

Cottrell, who worked 20 years for the department, said the policy took effect during Charlie Weis' coaching tenure, which began in 2005. Notre Dame officials did not respond to multiple messages left by Outside the Lines. Cottrell said he only came across the policy when dealing with athletes, although university officials have said in prior media reports that athletes did not receive special treatment.

The policy is in place specifically so that University employees are not caught up in and have no opportunity to obstruct the justice system. The policy makes tons of sense because you don't want coaches put in the situation of James Franklin where they're potentially seeing evidence (and/or allegedly instructing players to delete the evidence and/or contacting the victim). They phrase it like it's a bad thing when it's actually one of the most sensible policies imaginable.

The bolded is particularly hilarious because of course it's usually going to come up with athletes... when else would you be trying to contact someone at an athletic event or through the athletic department? A similar policy exists for going through uninvolved academic faculty, but unlike an athlete that spends more time in their facilities than they do in their place of residence, normal people run on a pretty regular schedule where it's not that hard to find them at their dorm/house/apartment.

 

[JTLA]

What is the point of this story? This feels like an Onion headline to me.

High profile athletes get extra protection and support? No sh!t sherlock? In other news, rain is wet.

As a joe average loser college student, when I got in trouble, it reflected on me, myself, and I - and maybe my parents if want to go that route. If you represent a school as an athlete - the school is reflected as well, so they try to help.

In other news, fat people eat a lot.

 

[phork]

I Hate Articles Like This

I Hate Articles Like This

Outside the Lines: College athletes at major programs benefit from confluence of factors to sometimes avoid criminal charges

Having ND and FLA mentioned in same article is disturbing.

 

[anarin]

You're late to the party

 

[IrishinSyria]

Just skimmed the article, but ND comes off looking really good there. Check out the graph in the middle of the piece.

 

[NDdomer2]

Everyone may understand it happens but at least someone is trying to call these universities out a little bit. At least in my opinion.

 

[wizards8507]

In other news, fat people eat a lot.

As to the articles posted... you'll here no word of defense from me.

 

[Legacy]

I agree with Phork about this "study".

Each school has a link for the results. ND's lists four incidents of arrests from 2009-14 with two players charged (one was Rees' running from the police).

According to Outside the Lines, Notre Dame has a 2% incidence of all "football and men's basketball players from 2009-14 were suspects in criminal incidents." From 2009-14, ND football enrolled 254 players. Another 69 signed from 2006-08 (I'll assume most were on the 2009 team) A twenty-five percent attrition rate of those 69 would leave 52. Add three B-ball players per year (2007-14) would give another 24.

So, 254+52+24=330 football and basketball players over that time span that ESPN studied. 4 incidents of the 330=1.2%
Fifty percent of those incidents (2) led to charges being filed (0.6%) against players.

The stated main point of the article is that fb and bb players receive preferential treatment. Wouldn't you want to compare the 1.2% incidence of players to the incidence of students overall at ND? Don't you think that 1% of all non-players/students at ND may be involved in incidences of possible crime(s) using the same records (SB police)?

OTL also notes five states (North Carolina, Georgia, Virginia, Texas and Ohio) that require campus police of private universities to make their records public. So, why not use data from any private university in those states for the "study" to include campus police incidents?

The Outside the Lines report on athlete behavior is important and incredibly frustrating (from one of the SBNation college football writers) who makes his points.

 

[md_bennett]

It's a hit piece against the system and a slap in the face to Notre Dame for denying their request. The fact that they even went to court and lost the case seems to have no bearing, they just wanted to target the Irish for not cooperating in such a blatantly biased piece of journalism. I by no means defend this going on, but no matter the findings, the author was going to try to paint everybody in a bad light because that's the cool thing to do now-a-days

 

[IrishLax]

It's a hit piece against the system and a slap in the face to Notre Dame for denying their request. The fact that they even went to court and lost the case seems to have no bearing, they just wanted to target the Irish for not cooperating in such a blatantly biased piece of journalism. I by no means defend this going on, but no matter the findings, the author was going to try to paint everybody in a bad light because that's the cool thing to do now-a-days

It's the definition of yellow journalism:

presents little or no legitimate well-researched news and instead uses eye-catching headlines to sell more newspapers.

Paula Lavigne set out to write a hit piece against specific colleges. She -- almost hilariously -- ignores schools like Michigan that had numerous high profile domestic assault and rape cases involving football players. There was no chance that her findings weren't going to be cast in the most negative light possible for the biggest headline she could muster, and what she actually uncovered were dubious stats and conclusions at best plus the same high profile incidents we already knew about.

 

[Circa]

Can someone start a poll. Fox news needs help with theirs.