After all the headlines, controversy and the loss of his job, former Syracuse assistant coach Bernie Fine will not be charged in his ongoing child molestation case.
The news comes via Syracuse.com, after officials spent nearly a year researching over 100,000 pages of documents and listening to the testimony of several alleged victims. Steven Clymer, an assistant United States Attorney, filed court documents on Friday morning officially ending the investigation that began when former Orange ball-boys Bobby Davis and Mike Lang, who are stepbrothers, made accusations that Fine sexually abused them as children in the 1980s. Two additional accusers, Zach Tomaselli and Floyd Van Hooser, have since admitted to lying about their accusations.
It’s small consolation for Fine, who lost his job just 10 days after he was accused of these crimes.
The big question now is, what’s the university going to do? Fine was a long-time assistant under coach Jim Boeheim for 35 years who was immediately cast aside. Will they offer him his old job? Will Fine file a wrongful termination suit? Will the program jump the gun and offer him some sort of cash settlement as penance? I’d be willing to bet the school has something planned to apologize to Fine.
If they don’t that’s a travesty. In this country -- to go all America on you -- you’re innocent until proven guilty and in the wake of the Jerry Sandusky case, Syracuse jumped the gun to make sure that there wasn’t an trouble as a university if something did happen. Nothing did and now there are going to be consequences for the school not having any trust in Fine.
Fine has denied all wrongdoing since the charges came about.
While none of us will know the whole story and who is telling the truth, it’s at least great to hear that were weren’t experiencing some sort of sick trend within college sports of coaching violating the trust they have with young people for some twisted and disgusting need.
David Harten is the editor of The Backboard Chronicles. You can follow him on Twitter at @David_Harten.