It's not that weird at all when you consider it's how kids communicate. They prefer texting to a phone call, or *shocker* face-to-face conversation. So it's likely, as a coach, when a kid misses practice, the first you thing you do is send a text... "Hey. Where are you?"
Bergen Catholic Wrestling Program may be in a little hot water
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It's not that weird at all when you consider it's how kids communicate. They prefer texting to a phone call, or *shocker* face-to-face conversation. So it's likely, as a coach, when a kid misses practice, the first you thing you do is send a text... "Hey. Where are you?"
I think even if taken as merely overly-friendly, the natural reaction of many kids would be confusion.
And even if most kids take it as it was innocently intended, it's still on the coach to assume that it's going to be taken the wrong way by some. You're in a position of trust, boundary awareness skills and knowing your audience are a must.
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"The room is not the same without you. The school is not the same either."
That goes way beyond a "casual" "I love you".
As a coach, this will certainly tighten-up my p's and q's. Our opening meeting will have an announcement that I will have student's numbers, and if parents have an issue, please let me know so that I can be sure to not communicate with them outside of practice.
As a club coach, I've had kids numbers forever. I'm not an "I love you" guy, more of a "You're a nancyboy" kinda guy, but this should be a warning to coaches. There's a million reasons I text my athletes... Asking to set up a workout or reminder of alternate practice time, how's the knee, etc. Because some will take advantage, on either side, we gotta be smarter about it.
As a club coach, I've had kids numbers forever. I'm not an "I love you" guy, more of a "You're a nancyboy" kinda guy, but this should be a warning to coaches. There's a million reasons I text my athletes... Asking to set up a workout or reminder of alternate practice time, how's the knee, etc. Because some will take advantage, on either side, we gotta be smarter about it.
Maybe start a policy of copying the parents on all texts. I know that would get to be a contact management nightmare, but better safe than sorry.
Adoption at a consumer level is slow, but something like Slack is ideal for this kind of communication. I'm so tired of all these "messenger wars" makes VHS vs. Betamax seem quaint and simple.
Had an acquaintance who was a womens track coach who texted his athletes......hes no longer a coach
#dangerwillrogerdanger
Flo ripped this kid and his parents when this came out originally... Not a good look now.
His attorneys said he had texts of a questionable nature. I guess he did. My feeling at the time was that it was highly likely he actually did have them. It's just too stupid a move to put it out there if you didn't possess them.
https://www.northjersey.com/story/n...s-sex-counts-bergen-catholic-case/1024568002/
Dont rip Flo yet, this case is crumbling at every turn.
Dont rip Flo yet, this case is crumbling at every turn.
That's a kind a strange interpretation but ok. The texts alone are going to present a problem for Bell and they aren't going anywhere.
Furthermore, the account doesn't say whether the causes of action were dismissed with or without prejudice. The language that:
"By leaving intact Asatrian’s claim that he suffered emotional distress, the judge left open the possibility that his lawyers could now develop additional evidence against Bergen Catholic, Bell and the school's administrators through a court-ordered discovery process."
suggests the claims were dismissed without prejudice, which is a lot different than with prejudice. It essentially means that there is not enough evidence now, but that such evidence could be uncovered and the claims revived.
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Whatever the outcome, I won't give them a pass. They didn't have all the facts and basically discredited the claim based on the coach's reputation.
Right. There was a taking a side problem instead of practicing journalism, but the bigger problem for me was characterizing the motives of the wrestler and his family with particular allegations that were belied by the texts. Granted, the lawsuit alleged facts that weren't accurate, which may be the fault of the wrestler or perhaps the fault of the lawyer drafting the complaint, but Flo didn't know any of that for certain at the time. Their editorial stance was reckless and, in retrospect, wrong.
The linked article characterizing Bergan Catholic has having scored a "victory" because most of the claims were tossed is a weird take, and I doubt they're looking at it that way. A "victory" would be having it all tossed out, but they actually lost a motion to dismiss on at least two claims, meaning that a judge saw enough to proceed to trial. In all likelihood that'll result in a settlement because, well, most things settle, but more importantly, the school (and their insurer) would suffer greatly from putting a 15 year old student on trial and arguing that he had no basis to feel like he did felt when he received weird text messages from his coach.
no matter the outcome..this is attention that wrestling does not need!
So it's ok for journalists to repeat unsubstantiated claims against the accused, tainting the jury pool in any future trial. It's not ok to repeat unsubstantiated rumors against the alleged victim?
I thought it was refreshing to see a group of media folks take a stand. You can call text creepy or whatever you like. That family/lawyer used the words sexual assault against a wrestling coach, that is career destruction. That is intent on career destruction. There is no way in my mind that you get from there very worst way you can take those texts (grooming, with no prior history of incidents) let alone the most harmless (awkward communication) to sexual assault, without having retribution as your main motive.
In a day and age of convicting people in the media , I welcome FLO's take on this. They probably saved the guys career.
I agree the lawsuit, on the whole, was an overreaction and contained unsubstantiated allegations (keeping in mind we're still only seeing what the parties want us to see; there's typically selective disclosure happening on both ends). But the thrust of Flo's take was that the suit was filed in bad faith, and I think these texts indicate that it wasn't. Your suggestion that today's media environment required Flo to essentially serve as Bell's defense counsel contains a dangerous assumption about how journalism works or at least should work. Flo was right to be skeptical of the claims in the lawsuit, but reckless and wrong, as it turns out, in speculatively characterizing the motives of the family in filing it. Whether the remaining claims in the lawsuit succeed or fail, it doesn't appear to have been filed in bad faith.
But I do agree that the original complaint had some serious problems given that there was apparently no basis for some of the claims. I think the lawyer is probably to blame for that, but I'm guessing. The lawyer, in interviewing the client, has their eyes in two places--the facts as told, and how those facts relate to a claim. They'll sometimes ask leading questions, hoping to join the facts to those claims, and the client may follow that lead and tell the lawyer what he/she thinks the lawyer wants to hear. That's not to excuse anyone, I'm just identifying how/why these things happen.
In federal court Rule 11(b) addresses sanctionable filings, and NJ has a similar rule, Rule 1:4-8(a)(3), which renders sanctionable pleadings whose "factual allegations have [no] evidentiary support." Even though some of plaintiff's claims survived, Bell's attorney should ask for sanctions against the plaintiff's attorney over the claims that didn't survive and had no factual basis.
But therein lies a major problem -- as the saying goes, where do I go to get my reputation back?
Not saying Bell is in the clear, don't want to engage in a debate over the this-and-that over this particular case. Just saying that "sanctions against the plaintiff's attorney" do absolutely nothing for the person on the receiving end of slanderous claims.
Facts alleged inside a complaint are generally considered privileged but the rule I cited is pretty effective in disincentivizing false claims in a complaint because the lawyer could lose their license, so I'd not characterize it as a "major problem."
Except (reading between the lines) those claims may have been dismissed without prejudice which would make sanctions inappropriate. In NJ, you can be faced with a weird situation - the entire controversy doctrine requires you join any and all claims against a party in one action. If you don't have enough facts to support a claim before discovery, do you assert a possible claim and have it dismissed without prejudice to protect your client or do you not assert it in your pleading and risk having it barred later by the entire controversy doctrine?
When I was practicing, I had a case wherein I had to outmaneuver a New York attorney (who, although admitted in NJ, clearly didn't have a handle on NJ law) who tried to separate causes of action to his client's benefit.
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I can say that I have written see strange text in a joking matter with my friends and taken alone would look weird or construed as uncomfortable. I have no idea what the relationship with the kid and coach is, but I would need to hear and see a lot more before I would take either side in this case.
Drunk drivers face greater penalties than disbarment, right?
Point being,: that would be the system view, and maybe the system is optimally effective, but that doesn't do much good for those affected by people ignoring or willing to risk the consequences.
Reputations are a funny thing. When you've been slimed, there are legal punishments and remedies -- when they can be applied -- but even so that often doesn't make the stigma go away.
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Well, since you suggested it was a "major problem" and didn't want to get into the details of this particular case, my response assumed that you were asking for a solution from a systems vantage, since you didn't offer a solution yourself. Unless your solution was to penalize attorneys for filing frivolous claims the same as drunk drivers, in which case I'd again draw attention to my point that it's already sufficiently disincentivized and not actually a major problem. (The more typical problem you see in frivolous claims is unsupported legal arguments, unsupported material facts are rare, because, really, that's the easy part.)
Returning to individuals, it's worth noting that Bell had a remedy that the family didn't, that being Flo's phone number and the general assurance that they'd uncritically and unquestioningly pass along his spin. For anyone who follows HS wrestling at the national level, all they've heard for months is that the wrestler's family filed a lawsuit out of spite because the wrestler didn't get a starting spot, and maliciously tried to ruin Bell. Seems like there were more reputations than Bell's that took a hit here.
And yes, Bell is more widely known, but it's still a small enough world that any coach will be wary of the family. My point being that there are significant disincentives to even filing such a lawsuit; frivolous lawsuits of this sort aren't epidemic. If anything, recent history has taught us that sex abuse of minors is under-reported and the systems and entities tend to protect the accused, often to obscene extremes.
