But they did chat with a couple of members of the Baylor Board of Regents, several of whom are not at all pleased that nettlesome accusations of gang rapes and assaults had pushed out a beloved coach and athletic director. Liberty University officials did not ask to speak with Pepper Hamilton, the law firm that conducted the investigation, Stevens said. He last coached there in 1992 - 11 years before McCaw’s arrival. Teaff, 83, is a football legend at Baylor. “We checked with Coach Grant Teaff, who knows lots of people there.” Whom did your people talk to at Baylor, I asked. He was a friendly fellow and quickly agreed that what we had here were conflicting accounts. So I called Len Stevens, a spokesman for Liberty University. A university spokesman mumbled something about issues.Īn hour or so later, she emailed me: “The university prefers not to comment.” According to Texas Monthly, Baylor officials made a few not-so-pointed inquiries and cleared Ukwuachu.Īs my colleague Joe Nocera has pointed out, reporters the next year asked why Ukwuachu was still sitting out during games. While forgoing football for the year required of athletic transfers, he sexually assaulted a freshman soccer player. At Boise State, he was found to have beaten a former girlfriend. When Briles chose to bring in Sam Ukwuachu, a talented defensive end who transferred from Boise State, all involved should have known his background, which was deeply troubling.Īt 6 feet 4 and 220 pounds, Ukwuachu was a terror to opposing quarterbacks, and to women with the misfortune to make his acquaintance. McCaw, who had spoken of his hand-in-glove working relationship with Briles, oversaw all of this. This, the report found, “reinforces the perception” - and, of course, the reality - “that rules applicable to other students are not applicable to football players.” The football team existed in the same hermetic world found at too many top college programs. The report’s summary gloried in passive language, and in an act of apparent Christian charity, it omitted all names and, therefore, any accountability.īut this is what it meant, if not what it said: Athletic leaders (that would be McCaw) and football coaches learned of accusations of gang and date rape and decided not to report that violence they met with the alleged victims, and their parents, and still did nothing. The law firm Pepper Hamilton, which oversaw the inquiry, said it had found that the “the choices made by football staff and athletics leadership, in some instances, posed a risk to campus safety and the integrity of the University.” “If he made any mistakes at Baylor,” Falwell said - let us pause here to appreciate his use of the conditional - “they appear to be technical and unintentional.” There is not an athletic director in America, Falwell added, who better understands the importance of complying with federal guidelines on reporting any sexual assault on a campus.Īt this point, it’s worth recalling the summary that Baylor provided about its confidential investigation. Far from being pushed out of Baylor, Falwell said, McCaw’s “decision to resign was his own choice.” He said Liberty had conducted an “investigation.” It found that McCaw was a fine man. As the university’s Facebook page filled up with angry comments, Falwell felt compelled to offer explanations on the university’s website. The hiring of McCaw has also proved contentious.
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