A series of unrelated events
By June 1, 2012
Vanderbilt head football coach James Franklin said Wednesday that he makes hiring decisions based on what the wives look like.
“I’ve been saying it for a long time, I will not hire an assistant coach until I’ve seen his wife,” Franklin said on 104.5 The Zone in in Nashville. “If she looks the part, and she’s a D-1 recruit, then you got a chance to get hired. That’s part of the deal.
“There’s a very strong correlation between having the confidence, going up and talking to a woman, and being quick on your feet and having some personality and confidence and being fun and articulate, than it is walking into a high school and recruiting a kid and selling him.”
September 18, 2013
Vanderbilt University on Tuesday dismissed wide receiver Chris Boyd from the football team and athletic program four days after he pleaded guilty to helping cover up an alleged on-campus gang rape.
The star athlete accepted a yearlong probation sentence and agreed to testify against four men accused directly in the crime.
Vanderbilt’s athletic administration conducted a review of the case, including information disclosed at Friday’s hearing.
“The review concluded that Mr. Boyd’s admitted actions are clearly inconsistent with the high standards of behavior expected of our student-athletes,” a vice chancellor said in a statement.
After prosecutors laid out the case against him, Boyd pleaded guilty to one count of being an accessory after the fact. As part of his plea deal, Boyd said he will willingly pay court costs, face 11 months and 29 days of unsupervised probation and “testify truthfully” against the men he helped in June.
Friday’s court hearing revealed information about the prosecutors’ case against the four former Commodores players charged with rape.
Davidson County Deputy District Attorney Tom Thurman alleged in court that early on June 23, Brandon Vandenburg took an unconscious Vanderbilt student into a building on campus. Thurman said he was joined in his dorm room by three others also charged with rape — Cory Batey, Brandon Banks and Jaborian McKenzie.
“Different individuals” then sexually assaulted the young woman, the prosecutor said, as captured by CNN affiliate WSMV. Vandenburg texted the 21-year-old Boyd a picture of her, which Boyd promptly erased so his girlfriend wouldn’t see it, Thurman said.
Soon after that text, Vandenburg called Boyd, “saying the victim had been messed with in the hall and sexually assaulted in the room, and he needed Mr. Boyd to come over,” Thurman said.
Boyd went over and, with two other people, moved the woman — who was lying in the hall unconscious, partially clothed — to a room, put her on a bed and then left, Thurman said.
Subsequently, Boyd exchanged texts with Vandenburg and Batey, Thurman said. In one, Boyd said, “Tell the boys to delete that sh**. I’m looking out for your a**.” Boyd also texted his girlfiend that he “got everything cleared up” and “deleted everything,” Thurman said.
More texts followed the next day, including one in which Boyd detailed how he had helped move the young woman and said “she doesn’t know anything that happened.” Boyd also talked about it with Vandenburg, Batey, Banks and McKenzie at a Popeyes restaurant, Thurman said.
October 28, 2013
Penn State announced Monday it will pay $59.7 million to settle claims by 26 young men who said they were sexually abused by former assistant football coach Jerry Sandusky, capping a year of negotiations.
News of some of the settlements has been trickling out in recent months. The university said six claims are still outstanding. It has rejected some of them and is in talks to settle the others.
“We hope this is another step forward in the healing process for those hurt by Mr. Sandusky, and another step forward for Penn State,” University President Rodney Erickson said in a statement.
“We cannot undo what has been done, but we can and must do everything possible to learn from this and ensure it never happens again at Penn State.”
Sandusky, 69, is serving 30 to 60 years in prison after being convicted of 45 counts of child sexual abuse last year.
November 13, 2013
Court filing in Vandy rape case seeks text messages from coaches
NASHVILLE, Tenn. — A new court filing in the case against four former Vanderbilt University football players charged with rape seeks evidence of text messages sent by “coaches” that lawyers for one of the ex-players think could shed light on what happened.
The filing by attorneys for one of the players offers the first suggestion in court proceedings that members of the Vanderbilt football staff might have had some level of involvement in the incident that would be relevant to the criminal investigation.
California-based defense attorneys for former player Brandon Vandenburg said in their motion that a “large amount” of evidence has not been provided to them by Davidson County authorities as it should have been under the rules of discovery in criminal cases.
January 9, 2014
Reporter: USC Passed On James Franklin Due To Vanderbilt Players’ Ongoing Rape Case
Unlike many other reporters, Wolken took a look at some of the downsides to hiring Franklin, including the pending rape case against several of his players at Vanderbilt . . .
“I know for a fact that that is the reason that he was not in the mix at Southern Cal. They took a look at that situation, they knew about that situation, and he was not in the mix at all for that job primarily because of that.”
January 10, 2014
Penn State offered Vanderbilt’s James Franklin its head-coaching position on Wednesday after a long meeting with the search committee in Florida, according to the Scranton Times-Tribune.
Franklin, 41, is expected to decide Thursday, according to the report.
There have been many conflicting reports regarding the Nittany Lions’ coaching position. The Penn State beat writer for the Centre Daily Times tweeted after the Times-Tribune story that a high-ranking PSU official said nobody had been offered the job.
Franklin, a Pennsylvania native, has become one of the hottest coaching names with his success with the Commodores, winning 24 games over the past three seasons.