California
Athletes in $2.8 billion college lawsuit tell judge they want to create a players’ association
The athletes whose lawsuit against the NCAA is primed to pave the way for schools to pay them directly also want a players’ association to represent them in the complex contract negotiations that have overtaken the sport.
Grant House, Sedona Prince and Nya Harrison wrote to the judge overseeing what’s known as the House settlement, saying that although they are generally happy with the terms of the proposed settlement “there still remains a critical need for structural changes to protect athletes and prevent the failures of the past.”
That, they said, would be a players’ association, which they believe will help their voices be better heard as the NCAA and its schools move toward a system to share hundreds of millions in TV and ticket revenue with players.
The players said an association would help standardize name-image-likeness (NIL) contracts to establish minimum payments and health protections “and to create an ecosystem where athletes can thrive.”
“While professional leagues include athletes in these decisions through their respective players’ associations, the college system continues to prevent our players’ association from representing us at the decision-making tables,” the letter said.
The settlement, with a price tag of $2.8 billion that will be distributed over the next 10 years to players both past and present, does not address whether athletes should be considered employees of the schools. That’s an issue the NCAA is asking Congress to prevent for fear the costs could wreck college sports.
The NCAA did not immediately respond to a message from The Associated Press seeking comment Tuesday.
Earlier this year, the head of the National College Players Association confirmed that a licensing organization that works with the NFL Players’ Association had emailed thousands of college football players, encouraging them to join the NCPA. Separately, the chairman of another group trying to organize college athletes, athletes.org, said it already had some 4,000 members. The players who wrote the letter said they wanted to work with athletes.org.
A hearing to approve the settlement is set for April 7. The request could shape how U.S. Judge Claudia Wilken views the settlement’s long-term chances of succeeding, but plaintiffs’ attorney Jeffrey Kessler said the letter was an endorsement of the settlement and he doesn’t expect it to impact the agreement.
“All three of these athletes fully support approval of the settlement but wanted to express their additional views that a players’ association is also desirable,” Kessler said. “I salute their devotion to these issues and their fellow college athletes.”
Whether college athletes can ever be considered school employees is a thorny topic. There are multiple issues in front of the National Labor Relations Board, including a complaint against USC and the Pac-12; a unionization effort by the men’s basketball team at Dartmouth; an unfair labor complaint against Notre Dame; and a federal lawsuit in Pennsylvania filed by former Villanova football player Trey Johnson.
All of it could lead to college athletes being granted employee status, though court battles are assured.
New Mexico
Former college basketball player agrees to plea deal in sexual assault case
LAS CRUCES, N.M. (AP) — A former New Mexico State basketball player has agreed to a plea deal in a sexual assault case against teammates that led to the shutdown of the team’s 2022-23 season.
Kim Aiken Jr. agreed Tuesday to plead guilty to two felony counts of false imprisonment and one count of conspiracy to commit false imprisonment.
Aiken agreed to testify against another former teammate, Deshawndre Washington, whose trial in the assault case is set for February. If the deal holds up, Aiken would be sentenced to 4 1/2 years probation. He was originally charged with 11 crimes that carried up to 24 years in prison.
Aiken’s plea comes about two months after a teammate, Doctor Bradley, also agreed to testify against Washington in exchange for pleading guilty to disorderly conduct. If Bradley cooperates, he’ll receive probation after initially facing up to 27 years in prison.
The charges against Washington also carried a sentence of up to 27 years in prison.
Separate civil lawsuits in this case described a “humbling” ritual in which the defendants would pull down the victims’ pants and sometimes grab their genitals. The descriptions were in line with findings in the school’s Title IX investigation into the same players.
The indictments against the players detailed episodes in 2022 in which the defendants were accused “of holding younger players and student staff against their will while they violated them. Alleged acts included multiple incidents in which they forcefully restrained victims while violently grabbing their genital area.”
Last year, the school paid out $8 million to settle a lawsuit brought by two of the victims, former players Deuce Benjamin and Shak Odunewu, who went public with the stories of their abuse.
Louisiana
New Orleans attorneys accused of staging vehicle accidents in fraud
Eight people and two law firms have been charged in what authorities say was more than a decade-long scheme of staging vehicle crashes in the New Orleans area and then submitting fraudulent insurance claims, leading to what prosecutors allege was the murder of one person to cover it up.
The 10-count indictment, unsealed on Monday in the Eastern District of Louisiana, said the law firms Motta Law, LLC, and The King Firm, LLC, both of New Orleans, along with eight people, including attorneys, have been charged with conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, with some charged with additional counts.
The new indictment brings the total number of defendants charged to 63 in the federal probe into allegations of staged auto collisions, which authorities dubbed “Operation Sideswipe.”
Ryan J. Harris, 36, of New Orleans, has also been charged with witness tampering through murder, retaliation against a witness through murder and causing death through the use of a firearm. If convicted of any of those crimes, Harris would face a mandatory life sentence and up to a $250,000 fine for each count.
The complex system, beginning in 2011, involved people allegedly crashing vehicles into 18-wheelers and then fleeing while passengers in those vehicles pretended to be the drivers and lying about what happened. Authorities say those persons staged witnesses on site claiming it was the commercial vehicle’s fault, according to officials. Monday’s indictment alleges 22 collisions were staged by the defendants in the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Harris, who officials say was one of the people who crashed the vehicles, allegedly killed Cornelius Garrison in 2020, four days after Garrison was indicted for offenses related to the crashes. It was “part of a scheme to prevent Garrison from cooperating with the federal government and exposing the scheme to stage collisions,” according to officials. Garrison had been secretly working with the federal government since 2019 in connection with the scheme.
Sean Toomey, a lawyer representing Vanessa Motta, who was charged along with her law firm Motta Law, maintains his client’s innocence
“The government’s theory – that a lawyer barely a year out of law school decided to participate in a sprawling conspiracy – is terribly mistaken,” he said in a statement. “If these accidents were in fact staged, my client was also a victim and taken advantage by others.”
Officials claim that Motta was part of the effort to pursue fraudulent claims and lawsuits.
The King Firm, LLC, and Harris’ lawyer did not immediately respond to emails and phone calls from The Associated Press seeking comment.
The mail and wire fraud charge carries a penalty of up to 20 years imprisonment and up to a $250,000 fine or “twice the gross gain to any defendant or twice the gross loss to any victim.”
Kansas
Judge overturns conviction in case involving now-discredited detective accused of abusing women
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A judge has overturned a Black man’s conviction in a 2009 double homicide that was investigated by a discredited white Kansas City, Kansas, police detective.
The ruling Monday in the case of 34-year-old Cedric Warren came exactly one week after Roger Golubski died in an apparent suicide just before the start of his criminal trial over allegations that he sexually assaulted Black women.
Warren is now jailed in Wyandotte County while the prosecutor decides whether to retry him. A spokesman in the prosecutor’s office didn’t immediately respond to an email or phone message from The Associated Press seeking comment.
“I’m very thrilled,” Warren’s father, Cedric Toney, said in a phone interview Tuesday.
He said before Golubski supervised the investigation that led to his son’s arrest, the former detective stalked his daughter and his son’s mother. The allegation is similar to one raised in the case of Lamonte McIntyre, who served 23 years behind bars for a double homicide before he was freed. McIntyre’s mother has said Golubski pressured her for sexual favors.
But Wyandotte County Judge Aaron Roberts based his ruling in Warren’s case on something different. He ruled from the bench that prosecutors failed to turn over information about the severe mental health issues of a key witness in the drug house shooting that killed Charles Ford and Larry Ledoux.
The witness had schizophrenia, and offered a shifting account of what happened before he became the only person to link Warren to the killing, the defense wrote in court filings.
Attorneys for Warren argued that the prosecution should have known about the witness’ mental health struggles because they caused issues years earlier when he was charged with passing bad checks. A mental health exam in that case found the man was incompetent to stand trial and highlighted several psychiatric hospitalizations.
Police officers also were aware of the witness’ mental health struggles because they took him to a psychiatric facility after questioning him in the double homicide, the defense said.
The defense wrote that the undisclosed evidence “undermined his credibility and ability to competently and reliably recount events.”
The family’s claims that Golubski harassed Warren’s mother and sister haven’t been aired in court, said Lindsay Runnels, an attorney for Warren. She said that is largely because a judge was focused on their allegations that evidence was withheld.
“As far as Cedric Warren is concerned, out is out,” she said, adding she is confident he will be released and possibly soon.
But while Golubski’s role in Warren’s case didn’t play a role in Roberts’ decision, the allegations have led the county prosecutor’s office to undertake a $1.7 million effort to reexamine other cases he worked on during his 35 years on the force.
Cheryl Pilate, another attorney representing Warren, is pursuing another claim that a person Golubski investigated is innocent. She stressed that the problems in the community extended beyond one detective and that others also played a role.
“This was a one witness case with no corroborating evidence,” she said. “And the witness was someone who was very vulnerable and had very significant mental health issues.”
Athletes in $2.8 billion college lawsuit tell judge they want to create a players’ association
The athletes whose lawsuit against the NCAA is primed to pave the way for schools to pay them directly also want a players’ association to represent them in the complex contract negotiations that have overtaken the sport.
Grant House, Sedona Prince and Nya Harrison wrote to the judge overseeing what’s known as the House settlement, saying that although they are generally happy with the terms of the proposed settlement “there still remains a critical need for structural changes to protect athletes and prevent the failures of the past.”
That, they said, would be a players’ association, which they believe will help their voices be better heard as the NCAA and its schools move toward a system to share hundreds of millions in TV and ticket revenue with players.
The players said an association would help standardize name-image-likeness (NIL) contracts to establish minimum payments and health protections “and to create an ecosystem where athletes can thrive.”
“While professional leagues include athletes in these decisions through their respective players’ associations, the college system continues to prevent our players’ association from representing us at the decision-making tables,” the letter said.
The settlement, with a price tag of $2.8 billion that will be distributed over the next 10 years to players both past and present, does not address whether athletes should be considered employees of the schools. That’s an issue the NCAA is asking Congress to prevent for fear the costs could wreck college sports.
The NCAA did not immediately respond to a message from The Associated Press seeking comment Tuesday.
Earlier this year, the head of the National College Players Association confirmed that a licensing organization that works with the NFL Players’ Association had emailed thousands of college football players, encouraging them to join the NCPA. Separately, the chairman of another group trying to organize college athletes, athletes.org, said it already had some 4,000 members. The players who wrote the letter said they wanted to work with athletes.org.
A hearing to approve the settlement is set for April 7. The request could shape how U.S. Judge Claudia Wilken views the settlement’s long-term chances of succeeding, but plaintiffs’ attorney Jeffrey Kessler said the letter was an endorsement of the settlement and he doesn’t expect it to impact the agreement.
“All three of these athletes fully support approval of the settlement but wanted to express their additional views that a players’ association is also desirable,” Kessler said. “I salute their devotion to these issues and their fellow college athletes.”
Whether college athletes can ever be considered school employees is a thorny topic. There are multiple issues in front of the National Labor Relations Board, including a complaint against USC and the Pac-12; a unionization effort by the men’s basketball team at Dartmouth; an unfair labor complaint against Notre Dame; and a federal lawsuit in Pennsylvania filed by former Villanova football player Trey Johnson.
All of it could lead to college athletes being granted employee status, though court battles are assured.
New Mexico
Former college basketball player agrees to plea deal in sexual assault case
LAS CRUCES, N.M. (AP) — A former New Mexico State basketball player has agreed to a plea deal in a sexual assault case against teammates that led to the shutdown of the team’s 2022-23 season.
Kim Aiken Jr. agreed Tuesday to plead guilty to two felony counts of false imprisonment and one count of conspiracy to commit false imprisonment.
Aiken agreed to testify against another former teammate, Deshawndre Washington, whose trial in the assault case is set for February. If the deal holds up, Aiken would be sentenced to 4 1/2 years probation. He was originally charged with 11 crimes that carried up to 24 years in prison.
Aiken’s plea comes about two months after a teammate, Doctor Bradley, also agreed to testify against Washington in exchange for pleading guilty to disorderly conduct. If Bradley cooperates, he’ll receive probation after initially facing up to 27 years in prison.
The charges against Washington also carried a sentence of up to 27 years in prison.
Separate civil lawsuits in this case described a “humbling” ritual in which the defendants would pull down the victims’ pants and sometimes grab their genitals. The descriptions were in line with findings in the school’s Title IX investigation into the same players.
The indictments against the players detailed episodes in 2022 in which the defendants were accused “of holding younger players and student staff against their will while they violated them. Alleged acts included multiple incidents in which they forcefully restrained victims while violently grabbing their genital area.”
Last year, the school paid out $8 million to settle a lawsuit brought by two of the victims, former players Deuce Benjamin and Shak Odunewu, who went public with the stories of their abuse.
Louisiana
New Orleans attorneys accused of staging vehicle accidents in fraud
Eight people and two law firms have been charged in what authorities say was more than a decade-long scheme of staging vehicle crashes in the New Orleans area and then submitting fraudulent insurance claims, leading to what prosecutors allege was the murder of one person to cover it up.
The 10-count indictment, unsealed on Monday in the Eastern District of Louisiana, said the law firms Motta Law, LLC, and The King Firm, LLC, both of New Orleans, along with eight people, including attorneys, have been charged with conspiracy to commit mail and wire fraud, with some charged with additional counts.
The new indictment brings the total number of defendants charged to 63 in the federal probe into allegations of staged auto collisions, which authorities dubbed “Operation Sideswipe.”
Ryan J. Harris, 36, of New Orleans, has also been charged with witness tampering through murder, retaliation against a witness through murder and causing death through the use of a firearm. If convicted of any of those crimes, Harris would face a mandatory life sentence and up to a $250,000 fine for each count.
The complex system, beginning in 2011, involved people allegedly crashing vehicles into 18-wheelers and then fleeing while passengers in those vehicles pretended to be the drivers and lying about what happened. Authorities say those persons staged witnesses on site claiming it was the commercial vehicle’s fault, according to officials. Monday’s indictment alleges 22 collisions were staged by the defendants in the Eastern District of Louisiana.
Harris, who officials say was one of the people who crashed the vehicles, allegedly killed Cornelius Garrison in 2020, four days after Garrison was indicted for offenses related to the crashes. It was “part of a scheme to prevent Garrison from cooperating with the federal government and exposing the scheme to stage collisions,” according to officials. Garrison had been secretly working with the federal government since 2019 in connection with the scheme.
Sean Toomey, a lawyer representing Vanessa Motta, who was charged along with her law firm Motta Law, maintains his client’s innocence
“The government’s theory – that a lawyer barely a year out of law school decided to participate in a sprawling conspiracy – is terribly mistaken,” he said in a statement. “If these accidents were in fact staged, my client was also a victim and taken advantage by others.”
Officials claim that Motta was part of the effort to pursue fraudulent claims and lawsuits.
The King Firm, LLC, and Harris’ lawyer did not immediately respond to emails and phone calls from The Associated Press seeking comment.
The mail and wire fraud charge carries a penalty of up to 20 years imprisonment and up to a $250,000 fine or “twice the gross gain to any defendant or twice the gross loss to any victim.”
Kansas
Judge overturns conviction in case involving now-discredited detective accused of abusing women
KANSAS CITY, Kan. (AP) — A judge has overturned a Black man’s conviction in a 2009 double homicide that was investigated by a discredited white Kansas City, Kansas, police detective.
The ruling Monday in the case of 34-year-old Cedric Warren came exactly one week after Roger Golubski died in an apparent suicide just before the start of his criminal trial over allegations that he sexually assaulted Black women.
Warren is now jailed in Wyandotte County while the prosecutor decides whether to retry him. A spokesman in the prosecutor’s office didn’t immediately respond to an email or phone message from The Associated Press seeking comment.
“I’m very thrilled,” Warren’s father, Cedric Toney, said in a phone interview Tuesday.
He said before Golubski supervised the investigation that led to his son’s arrest, the former detective stalked his daughter and his son’s mother. The allegation is similar to one raised in the case of Lamonte McIntyre, who served 23 years behind bars for a double homicide before he was freed. McIntyre’s mother has said Golubski pressured her for sexual favors.
But Wyandotte County Judge Aaron Roberts based his ruling in Warren’s case on something different. He ruled from the bench that prosecutors failed to turn over information about the severe mental health issues of a key witness in the drug house shooting that killed Charles Ford and Larry Ledoux.
The witness had schizophrenia, and offered a shifting account of what happened before he became the only person to link Warren to the killing, the defense wrote in court filings.
Attorneys for Warren argued that the prosecution should have known about the witness’ mental health struggles because they caused issues years earlier when he was charged with passing bad checks. A mental health exam in that case found the man was incompetent to stand trial and highlighted several psychiatric hospitalizations.
Police officers also were aware of the witness’ mental health struggles because they took him to a psychiatric facility after questioning him in the double homicide, the defense said.
The defense wrote that the undisclosed evidence “undermined his credibility and ability to competently and reliably recount events.”
The family’s claims that Golubski harassed Warren’s mother and sister haven’t been aired in court, said Lindsay Runnels, an attorney for Warren. She said that is largely because a judge was focused on their allegations that evidence was withheld.
“As far as Cedric Warren is concerned, out is out,” she said, adding she is confident he will be released and possibly soon.
But while Golubski’s role in Warren’s case didn’t play a role in Roberts’ decision, the allegations have led the county prosecutor’s office to undertake a $1.7 million effort to reexamine other cases he worked on during his 35 years on the force.
Cheryl Pilate, another attorney representing Warren, is pursuing another claim that a person Golubski investigated is innocent. She stressed that the problems in the community extended beyond one detective and that others also played a role.
“This was a one witness case with no corroborating evidence,” she said. “And the witness was someone who was very vulnerable and had very significant mental health issues.”
