Student Government releases findings about Gibbons case
"The university was regularly missing its 60-day deadline to investigate sexual misconduct," Proppe said Sunday night. "The main reason, at least initially when the moved to the new policy, was that the university didn't have the bandwidth to handle all these investigations. They took about a year to hire a second investigator to look into this.
"So that was probably the most surprising and most concerning finding, that the delay in the Gibbons case was really not an exception but kind of the norm with these investigations."
Per the CSG's report, the task force claimed that athletic department officials did not believe the OIE or OSCR failed to notify the department "when a student athlete was accused of sexual misconduct." As a result of that finding, the task force concluded that "Brady Hoke knowingly issued false statements in December 2013 concerning the status of Gibbons."
The CSG's task force did not work in concert with officials from the U.S. Department of Education's Office of Civil Rights, which will be on campus this week to launch its own investigation into the university's sexual misconduct policy.
Quoting MLive
April 14th, 2014 at 10:42 AM ^
I disagree. He made a mistake by saying Gibbons had family issues. Could he have handled it better? I suppose so but it's not like he was covering up the abuse. What was as he supposed to say, "Gibbons won't play this week because he has been expelled from school due to his involvement in a sexual assault case"? If Hoke can be criticized in this, it's that he lacks PR accumen. Trying to apply his flawed PR skills to his coaching ability is a bunch of BS.
The most egregious issue is the school taking too long to investigate any and all sexual assault cases.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:49 AM ^
As has been said a million times, he simply should have said "violation of team rules." Not being enrolled in the university is certainly a violation of team rules. While I agree it's silly to try and tie this comment into coaching ability, you have to see that it's a little troubling that Hoke knew Gibbons got kicked out because the school believed he raped a girl, yet still chose to lay a little cover for his absence from bowl week.
April 14th, 2014 at 11:49 AM ^
enrolled a violation of team rules? I'm not currently enrolled, does that make me a violator of team rules? Of course not. Gibbons didn't travel because he wasn't a student of the University of Michigan. You would have Hoke tell a blatant lie instead of merely being a bit cagey with his wording?
April 14th, 2014 at 12:33 PM ^
Nobody is going to ask why you're not with the team, now are they? There's a limit to what he could have said legally about Gibbons' status according to university policy in disseminating confidential information. I'm not even sure he could have said Gibbons was expelled.
The problem people have with what he chose to say is that it suggests that Gibbons was unavailable through no fault of his own. In a world where a large, vocal contingent believes that sports culture on american campuses gives rise to sexual entitlement and "rape culture" among athletes, Hoke's statement is going to be very poorly received. It could be perceived, at worst, that Hoke was dismissive of the allegations and chose to lay cover for Gibbons. Now, I don't really believe that, but the problem with Hoke's statement is that it even gives rise to that interpretation.
If the wording of violation of team rules bothers you so much (even though, I'm fairly certain a rule for UM athletes is that they be in academic good standing, which Gibbons was not), Hoke could have simply said "he is no longer part of the team." Simple, with no explanation, yet still gives the clear implication that it was Gibbons' actions that caused his absence.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:51 AM ^
Let me clarify my point. What I was suggesting was that the perception of a cover-up (whether real or simply imagined) on the part of the media is bad. Which is why I prefaced the remark with asking if anyone knew if the 60 minutes report was accurate.
I was not trying to equate his coaching skills to this situation. Rather simply trying to put in context the crap he's been taking for the failure of the team on the field will be insignicant PR-wise to the impending shit storm that will break if, in fact, 60 Minutes does a report insunating a departmental cover-up.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:57 AM ^
Some folks would love it if the 60 Minutes thing were true, wouldn't they?
April 14th, 2014 at 11:38 AM ^
see the university and football team shielded from bad PR than to have simple justice served. The problem is that failing at the latter usually buys you the former in due course. In fact--as so many people have pointed out--the extent of the misteps, esp. by Hoke et al., may be very minor. They're paying kids to play in SEC country, but the damage goes on ramifying here. Being able to handle something like this adroitly and well should be part of a coach's duties.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:00 PM ^
Nobody wants to shield the football program, but it's not fair to hang Coach Hoke for the failure of the school to properly handle this case.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:10 PM ^
The justice system apparently fucked up, the university fucked up, the university then attempted to CORRECT its fuckup and continued to fuck up in the process, and now it's Hoke's fault for not blasting pixie dust over everything.
I would very much like to see justice served, but arbitrarily disseminating guilt and culpability isn't the way to accomplish this.
I just really don't see how Hoke is anything but a tangential part of this story. Notice how there doesn't appear to be any attempt to track down the stream of information within the athletic department. Clearly such an attempt would likely be rebutted, but it would make the investigation look better.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:19 PM ^
April 14th, 2014 at 12:48 PM ^
as to whether Hoke should be hung for his choice of words, that's just a ridiculous debate and far too heated at this point for my taste, but your comment seems a little silly to me.
One of the things this coaching staff recruits on is the fact that they are like a "family" and from all accounts the recruits are buying that. Parents are sending their kids to school for 4 years and entrusting these coaches to look after their children and there is much more to that than "coaching and recruiting football players, period".
I want to also be clear that I believe coach Hoke does a pretty good job at all the rest of the things that go along with just the "coaching" aspect of his job. He seems like a great guy who is a good influence on kids and really cares about those under his care.
To imply that a coaches job is just to coach and recruit suggests to me that you probably don't have kids and never played sports at high enough of a level where you left home at a young age to play. Trust me when I say that to those people, coaches are far more than just the guys calling the plays and sending their child letters of interest.
I completely misunderstood what you meant I guess because I would agree that a coach shouldn't have to worry as much about his words as most here think. Having said that, this is a pretty high profile job and part of it is public relations.
Personally I have never had an issue with how BH sounds in interviews and I also don't giver much of a shite what he said in this instance. My point was a coach does have a lot more responsibilities than just coaching which you seem to agree with so essentially...we agre on all counts I guess.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:43 PM ^
You're wasting your time trying to find some cloak and dagger with the head coach. Hoke didn't do anything worse than pick bad wording. And honestly, beyond the fact the University takes a long time to investigate sexual assault charges (which is a problem faced by lots of large organizations and governments), I just don't see how justice was subverted as much as sadly and predictably delayed.
April 14th, 2014 at 11:44 AM ^
if it turns out that they had a cover up for a guy who was such a shitty kicker when this all went down, i find that hard to believe. This story has been covered by every single michigan "news" outlet multiple times every chance they get so it would be the worst cover up since pete campbells comb over on mad men
April 14th, 2014 at 12:27 PM ^
April 14th, 2014 at 11:13 AM ^
has nothing to do with his coaching ability, who said that?
April 14th, 2014 at 11:34 AM ^
What was as he supposed to say, "Gibbons won't play this week because he has been expelled from school due to his involvement in a sexual assault case"?
Yes.
April 14th, 2014 at 11:43 AM ^
You'll never get put in front of that microphone.
Candor is one thing. Teenage naivete is another.
April 14th, 2014 at 11:46 AM ^
I'd do a lot better behind a microphone than Hoke did in this instance, I can tell you that.
April 14th, 2014 at 11:47 AM ^
Your schtick never gets old, does it?
April 14th, 2014 at 11:49 AM ^
What's your schtick?
April 14th, 2014 at 12:25 PM ^
you stated:
"
What was as he supposed to say, "Gibbons won't play this week because he has been expelled from school due to his involvement in a sexual assault case"?
Yes."
You are wrong. This has been covered previously, on the main page, and on the boards, including input from lawyers who are mgoreaders. No, Hoke couldn't say that, not without opening himself up to a lawsuit from the Gibbons family, for discussing the academic standing of a student publicly without that student's permission. Hoke's options were as follows, without exposing himself to a lawsuit:
a) "it's a familty matter"
b) "violation of team rules"
c) no comment
Both a and b were both half-truths, and he could've gone with either. He probably would've been better off with going with b, so it looked at least like Gibbons was being punished for something, in terms of appearance's sake. But, saying violation of team rules would've gotten the press searching for what that violation was, leading to a distraction right before a bowl game. Saying "family matter" nipped questions in the bud and allowed the team to focus on the game they were about to play. going with c would've also resulted in a press storm and distraction.
Hoke's options were as follows, without exposing himself to a lawsuit:
a) "it's a familty matter"
b) "violation of team rules"
c) no comment
FERPA allows the release of enrollment status.
Hoke could have said "He isn't a student at the university" with no legal repercussions.
At the time, Gibbons's enrollment status was the same as everyone else's--they were between terms and no one was enrolled. Gibbons had no exceptional enrollment status that could be released under FERPA.
When the new term started in January, the university stated that Gibbons was not enrolled. I don't think the timing was an accident.
negotiated the wording in order to get Gibbons to accept the dismissal withouth appeal. I would bet that Hoke said exactly what he was told to say by the university's lawyers.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:46 PM ^
So should Hoke and the university then direct all civil litigation your way?
This faux righteousness needs to end.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:28 AM ^
What a disaster.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:41 AM ^
I don't know what it is, but you seem to have one or two dedicated cyber stalkers who don't like ANYthing you say.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:51 AM ^
Even I know I'm annoying, so I have nothing against them.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:29 AM ^
I found the major takeaway from this article to be that Hoke knew that he was being investigated from the beginning of the season and waited to the very end to do anything about it (or you could say he did nothing about it). I get that the incident happened before he got there but it was being reopened in August this year. I don't think heads roll on this but it looks bad for Hoke and it should because it is.
As for the rest of the University, it looks bad but it is not surprising given the slow and cumbersome nature of handling something like this within a system not necessarily equipped to deal with this. They need to learn from this and make sure they have adequate staff available to take care of these situations in a timely manner. 60 should be plenty of time.
Either way you slice it, not good.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:39 AM ^
I just read the report. The Task Force actually concludes "As a result, CSG Task Force believes Brady Hoke knowingly issued false statements in December 2013 concerning the status of Gibbons." (my emphasis).
I also personally believe that he was aware when he was offering the statements, but they don't have anything besides circumstantial evidence to back it up, so it's not quite so definite.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:42 AM ^
April 14th, 2014 at 12:50 PM ^
Hoke couldn't really do anything to Gibbons while the investigation was ongoing; as noted below, if he suspends him and it turns out not to be true, then he's punished the guy unnecessarily. The reason we have due process is to protect against that outcome, and while it isn't perfect let's also not ignore the fact that the issue had apparently been investigated when it initially occurred and no charges were filled (I recognize there are various reasons for this decision).
And maybe I'm jaded, but having seen how the legal system generally works, I'm not really surprised it took more than 60 days to investigate claims. Chances are the person who investigates these sexual assault claims does more than just that (because I suspect the University doesn't have THAT many sexual assault claims at any one time), and the workload sounds heavy. I'm sure lots of deadlines are missed/pushed back, and probably without nefarious reasons.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:31 AM ^
Epic failure all around, which we pretty well knew. The only new bit is the finding that Brady Hoke wasn't above board when making his statements in December.
I wonder whether the University will issue any sort of official response to the CSG's report?
April 14th, 2014 at 11:33 AM ^
They will likely not issue a response. They haven't been keen on press releases throughout this entire story. They want it to go away.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:34 AM ^
No way around that.
The second part is what I perceive to be pretty much an non-issue that people want to turn into an issue. Did Hoke know in Dec about what happened? Yes. Was he also likely told how to handle it (by not directly saying what happened)? Absolutely. He listened to his employer and their interpretation of FERPA. What if the investigation came back and showed that Gibbons didn't warrent punishment, yet had not played the entire season due to a reason that wasn't even public? That seems unfair and unreasonable all the way around. After the investigation was completed? You certainly don't let him play. I think Hoke did that as soon as he was informed of the result.
People point to how long it took to happen, which they have every right to. The first quote above shows that the university was not prepared to take action sooner, which is an issue. But to point out that Hoke didn't suspend him against Iowa (likely because he didn't yet know the findings), but then did against OSU and in the bowl, is contradictory in the point they're attempting to make. If he played him knowingly against Iowa, he would have done the same in a much bigger game against OSU.
Say what you will about claiming "injuries" or "family problems" to the media, or if he should have said "violation of team rules" instead, but his employers were telling him not to come out and say "hey, our kicker was expelled for sexual misconduct, and won't be travelling with us", which for some reason people seem to be expecting in this situation.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:34 AM ^
i don't believe that "they told me to do it" is much of an excuse for a head coach. if he was uncomfortable, he could have told the department that he preferred to respond "no comment."
April 14th, 2014 at 10:51 AM ^
There can be a debate about what should have been said (or potentially not said, as with "no comment"), but what does that really change? If he says "no comment" because he didn't feel comfortable as the head coach, is he doing anything more than saying it was a "family issue", which you could argue tangentially it was? To me, that is fairly insignificant in the scope of this whole thing, but people want to make a big deal of it because it's low-hanging fruit.
That's not to say this is the only instance of that sort of thing (picking the low-hanging fruit), but I think with many touchy issues it is often the case. People go with what will make a splash and get readers and look like they care, when it does very little to actually address and fix the very real problem. This happens with issues of racism, sexism, etc, etc, very real problems, like this, that don't properly get addressed because people think "no comment" is a significant and important fix over saying "family issue".
Not bashing you, because I agree that "no comment" would have been better. I just really don't think it's the issue at all in this case though.
April 14th, 2014 at 11:16 AM ^
i love how words are only important when they're spoken by Saban, or Urb or Tressel etc.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:17 PM ^
it matters to how hoke is perceived by the media. like it or not, that matters.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:40 PM ^
does media perception of Hoke matter? They likely think him an oaf from his manner of speaking and have thought so since January 2011. Has that mattered?
April 14th, 2014 at 10:46 AM ^
April 14th, 2014 at 11:19 AM ^
I think there's a middle ground that a lot of people are in here that you kind of ignore or wash away. Saying "family matter" can only be explained by someone at the University lying to Hoke or Hoke lying to the media. There really isn't another explanation. So, if it was unclear legally how to phrase it, I don't think it's unreasonable for them to have come up with something other than an easily disproved lie.
It IS a family matter. You don't think getting expelled from school is a family matter? You don't think a review board finding enough evidence to expel you for a crime you claim you didn't commit is a family matter? You don't think this affects his whole family?
It's certainly not the whole truth, but it's not untrue. I don't like the wording, either, but I understand trying to shut down the line of questioning.
I also don't like the "violation of team rules" comment. I would have preferred, "He is dealing with a personal issue and will not be with the team." But people would have called that a lie too.
Perhaps, "no comment" is the best answer in terms of honesty, but it ignites a media frenzy to find out what's going on with Gibbons and creates needless distractions for the innocent memebers of the team.
This was a NO WIN situation for Hoke, and picking nits about his word choice is ridiculous. If he lied to investigators, then I hope he's fired. But an innocuous comment at a press conference? Come on. Hoke uses more egregious half-truths about depth chart, line-up, player development, scheme, and staff at almost every press conference.
"It's not the whole truth, but it's not untrue" sounds like something my 6 year old would tell me when she's trying to get out of trouble. I don't debate it was a no win, but it sure could have been a no lose. Half truths about depth charts and such are really not on the same level as this, and it's not close.
But my problem is that people (like myself sometimes) feel that because i donate my money and am a season ticket holder i deserve to know everything that is going on in this program. This is not the case though. Was I shocked and pissed when i found out Gibbons was expelled? Of course I was and still am. None of my anger is directed at the coach of the football team though, its mostly directed towards the player who put himself in a bad situation.
My understanding of FERPA is that Hoke couldn't come out and say that Gibbons was expelled due to the findings in a sexual assault investigation. If this is not the case then what I have been told about FERPA is incorrect but as far as i know Hoke's statement was not against the law (which him divulging the truth would have been).
In the end I think that this was a bit of a family matter anyways. Gibbons was no longer allowed to be apart of the team and had in fact been told he was no longer a part of the University so that left Gibbons with only his family to turn to. As far as I know he went home to his family and had to deal with this harsh realization.
April 14th, 2014 at 10:47 AM ^
for Gibbons' dismissal. It's hard for me to believe Coach Hoke meant to conceal the truth, but when your head coach states a lie perceived to protect an alleged rapist, he's going to be heavily scrutinized at the very least. I think it only makes matters worse if the university instructed him to state what he did. Whether the university acted correctly, the media could skewer it for this.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:48 PM ^
to know how it came that Hoke said what he said. You seem comfortable that it came from above--and I am inclined to agree. That then begs the question of who directed him: the University/Mary Coleman, the legal department/outside counsel or the Athletic Department/Brandon. It almost had to be one of them--and which one has its own discreet implications IMHO.
Now that shouldn't really absolve Hoke as he is a big boy and shouldn't let anyone dictate what he says about the program--particularly something deceptive at best.
April 14th, 2014 at 12:58 PM ^
No matter how big you may get in life, you're unlikely to ever be so important that you can simply ignore the advice of your employer's legal counsel.