Examining College Athletics: The Misty Realm of Crime and Control

This is a guest submission by Justin Ross, a journalism student at the University of Florida.

Although the University of Florida prides itself on research and academic prestige, it is the athletes who carry a school’s reputation on a national stage.

These elite competitors captivate millions of diehard fans, but not without scrutiny. This criticism comes with a common perception that athletes escape legal troubles and receive preferential treatment.

Evading Tackles

University of Florida running back Jordan Scarlett was arrested for marijuana charges in December. He later signed an agreement stating his charges may be dismissed if he doesn’t commit another crime in the next six months.

Chris Rainey was a suspect in five Gainesville crimes during his time as a Gator running back from 2007-2011. He faced charges only once.

Former tight end Aaron Hernandez punched an employee in the head at a local restaurant in 2007. Police recommended a felony charge, but even with a ruptured eardrum, the employee asked to drop the charges.

All three Gators hold an eerie parallel that stretches beyond the football field—dodging the law.

From 2009-2014, 80 of the school’s athletes were suspects in over 100 crimes.

Fifty-Six percent of them never faced charges, had them dropped or were not prosecuted. When cases of non-athlete, college-aged males were examined in Gainesville, only 28 percent held the same result.

This data came from an ESPN Outside the Lines investigation of 10 major football and men’s basketball programs, which was published in June.

This absence of discipline may even create consistent concern.

Rainey? Arrested in 2013 for battery. Released from the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Hernandez? Guilty of first-degree murder in 2013. Released by the New England Patriots. Sentenced to life in prison.

Managing these players can be difficult, but word-of-mouth speaks of a guy who knows what he’s doing. He’s an attorney, a local guy—or maybe just a legal magician whose greatest act is one that the public can’t seem to figure out.

Having been an attorney for 40 years, Huntley Johnson is the go-to guy for UF athletes who find themselves in legal troubles.

Despite the data, Johnson says he doesn’t believe players receive preferential treatment.

“What happens is, there are so many hundreds and thousands of students and other people that are arrested and don’t get charged that it seems like there are a lot of athletes, but I don’t think it’s out of whack at all,” he explained.

State Attorney Bill Cervone stood by Johnson’s sentiments:

“There seems to be this pervasive belief that they [athletes] get away with things because of their status, which simply isn’t true,” he said.

Cervone said it’s ironic that several of his staff members don’t even know when legal troubles involve an athlete, yet the appearance of unfair treatment is rampant.

Johnson estimates he’s represented thousands of students, but claims he holds no exclusive relationship with UF’s athletic department.

“Some athletes call me, some athletes call other people,” the local attorney said. “To my knowledge, there’s no direct pipeline or anything like that.”

Cervone assures Johnson provides routine employment contracts, fees and charges to practice good ethics.

“I know that the university on occasion has been unhappy with it because of the appearance that there’s some sort of collusion, but there’s not,” Cervone said.

In one column, a writer for the Orlando Sentinel said Johnson might be the Gators’ most valuable player besides Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Tim Tebow.

Johnson called that an opinion and declined to share his feelings about his value to UF athletics. He also shot down the possibility that athletes escape trouble because people fear community backlash.

“I think they [athletes] get treated fairly at the end of the day,” Johnson said.

In spite of these claims, many of the alleged victims in crimes involving athletes spoke anonymously in the report and said they refused to participate in criminal investigations because a fear of publicity.

But, why does the spotlight on athletes shine brightest?

Cervone cited the media’s obsession with prominence:

“In the same week, I may have had dozens of college kids charged with the same petty kind of offense, yet not a thing gets written about it,” he noted.

The state attorney also said the internal decisions of UF’s athletic department are justified, even if they’re scrutinized.

More than 30 players were arrested under Urban Meyer’s leadership from 2005-2010, which forced the school’s integrity into question.

Former Gator Percy Harvin became an example of mismanagement when he allegedly choked a coach and threw him to the ground, but was never punished, according to Sporting News.

Despite parallels between legal proceedings and the decisions of UF’s athletic department, Cervone said the two are separate tasks.

The state attorney acknowledged his relations with UF coaches and staff, but claims he does nothing more than alert them when an athlete gets in trouble, so they aren’t unaware.

“They have never once asked me to do or not do anything, and I have never once stuck my nose in what kind of discipline are you imposing,” Cervone said.

Sentiments of the Stars

Even with the statements of Johnson and Cervone, the same guy who was a suspect in five Gainesville crimes, Chris Rainey, turned heads during the Outside the Lines investigation.

“You still got Huntley, so, if anything happens, we got Huntley. So, he will get you out of anything, everything,” Rainey chuckled to a reporter.

This confidence may raise questions as to exactly how troubled athletes view criminality.

Ex-Gator Jamar Hornsby was arrested for using a stolen credit card nearly 70 times. He didn’t want to share his feelings in a formal interview, but did offer one glimpse.

“They slandered my namely character and pretty much ruined my career and never had all the facts to the story, and I don’t want to relive that again,” he commented.

But Channing Crowder, once a Gator linebacker, said he never felt above the law due to high-profile legal protection.

“No sir, I got arrested three times,” he said.

Crowder explained that Johnson is simply an attorney with an open office in Gainesville.

“My mom made 40-grand a year and had to pay for Huntley Johnson,” he said. “If you got arrested tonight, your parents could hire Huntley in the morning, and they would pay like my family did.”

Crowder admitted to having his charges lowered to misdemeanors, but he also said the life of an athlete isn’t completely glamorous.

“The university does help you, but it’s no walk in the park,” he added. “Gainesville is a fishbowl and big, black guys are literally and figuratively the big fish in the small pond.”

The big-fish, small-pond comparison is evident in UF’s student body. As of the 2015-2016 season, nearly 75 percent of players on UF’s football team and nearly 80 percent of players on UF’s men’s basketball team were black, compared to the school’s total black enrollment of only around 6 percent.

Crowder echoed the state attorney’s sentiments and said the public perception magnifies athletes and overlooks common people.

“When I was in jail there were literally 40-plus guys in my cell and none were UF athletes. How many of them got convicted?” he asked. “ It doesn’t matter cause they can’t knock a dude out on third down or shoot a 3-pointer better than most the world, so we don’t talk about them.”

A University’s Strength

Wade Davis, a former NFL player and activist for LGBT rights, said that in addition to magnifying athletes, universities marginalize minority populations.

This was apparent in UF’s 2015 SERU survey, or Student Experience in the Research University survey, where 86 percent of white students agreed or strongly agreed that students of their race or ethnicity were respected on campus.

Only 32 percent of black students felt the same way, which is a sharp decline from the previous total of 50 percent in 2013.

Davis explained that the cultural fragmentation minorities experience is something that is especially reflected on athletes—many of whom are black at UF.

He said one of the largest communities of poverty are people of color, and these communities value sports as a way out. Davis thinks universities exploit that and use athletes solely for on-field abilities.

He also mentioned people of poverty seek scholarships, which dissuades them from doing anything outlandish and forces them to accept their fragmentation within a university.

As a former NFL player, Davis said in college, although you do not receive direct monetary compensation, you notice others reap the benefits of your value.

The discussions of racial climate and crime among athletes were things people seemed to avoid at UF. Several coaches, communications representatives and athletes were unresponsive or didn’t cooperate to outreach via email or phone.

But, why the lack of communication about the elephant in the room, or alligator in this case?

It’s because the immense power of UF’s athletic association dictates how often and when athletes can speak.

An assistant director with the football program said the team typically doesn’t grant one-on-one interviews with football players unless it’s with an established media outlet.

A representative for baseball asked for the story’s deadline, only to never respond.

A spokeswoman for women’s basketball said the team is limited to 13 interviews for projects per semester.

“I actually don’t think most universities want their athletes to be socially engaged outside of what they do athletically,” Davis said.

UF’s athletic association is a non-profit entity, in that it supports itself and receives no direct state funding. This level of independence may allow the department to assert stringent control on communications.

Robert Littal, creator and CEO of BlackSportsOnline, said an interconnected society heightens the caution people proceed with.

Anything can blow up into a story in a matter of minutes, which dissuades people from talking or giving quotes, especially athletes. He explained when you’re a member of any team, company or organization, you want to eliminate controversy.

The strict surveillance of an athletic association finds itself at other universities too, not just UF.

This was exemplified when Oklahoma Sooners running back Joe Mixon met with reporters, marking the first time he did so after being suspended for allegedly punching a woman in the face.

A media representative oversaw Mixon’s press conference. Press members were told anyone who continued asking him non-football related questions would be escorted out. According to Tulsa World, one such exchange went like this:

“Has he [Mixon] had a desire to answer any non-football related questions?”

“No,” Mixon said.

‘Does he think that he should?”

“Not here,” Mixon chimed in.

“At any point, does he owe that to anyone?”

“No, not here,” he exclaimed. 

Harnessing Social Power

Despite the supervision of a school’s athletic department, Davis assured 100 percent that he would like to see athletes become more engaged, allowing them to harness their power.

Such was the case at the University of Missouri, an incident Davis thought serves as a model for the power collegiate athletes hold.

At Mizzou, students began protesting in October after an increase in reported racism on campus. African-American students complained about the school’s inability to handle these reports efficiently.

In November, football players announced a boycott of football-related activities, which dealt a heavy blow to the school and led the university’s president to step down.

Littal explained there’s a healthy fear that when you’re in a position of power, you don’t want to rock the boat to disrupt equilibrium. That is what made Mizzou’s incident so interesting, because athletes took a stand and caused disruption over racial issues.

In 2014, Business Insider rated UF as the school with the most dominant sports program in the entire country, which reflects several things including revenues, attendance and NCAA championships.

This illustrates the voice that athletes and students have access to at UF, which may match and even surpass the exposure students at Mizzou utilized.

Davis said college life could be different if people were engaged the way they were at Mizzou. But, he also mentioned there are barriers to becoming more socially knowledgeable.

For one, athletes usually don’t have someone who maintains both star power and the social knowledge to stand behind— with LeBron James being a rare example.

The basketball star’s activism includes sporting a hoodie as tribute to Trayvon Martin and wearing an “I Can’t Breathe” shirt in support of protests related to police killings. He was also voted the most popular NBA player for the 10th straight quarter, according to an ESPN survey.

Littal said he thinks athletes are aware of their abilities to create change, but with so many diverse opinions, it’s difficult for a large team like football to gain a full-backing on an issue.

“It’s good that we’re communicating better, and showing more, what real life is about, but it’s still a long ways to go,” Littal said.

With a public view that athletes receive preferential treatment, giving them a voice can help to extinguish that belief—a voice that can be provided by the very entity that oversees players and limits expression, the athletic association.

Davis said its import to understand every side of a discussion, even if you don’t identify with certain issues. Doing so may take courage, but breaking out of a position of comfort will enhance society’s understanding of these issues.

 

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