Ex-Illinois gym coach faces drunk-driving charge

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Posted on 28th October 2008 by gjohnson in Uncategorized

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Date: 10/28/2008

By DAVID MERCER
Associated Press Writer

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (AP) _ A former University of Illinois gymnastics coach resigned because of personal issues, including a pending drunk-driving charge in Wisconsin, and is cooperating with an investigation into a video camera found in a locker room, his attorney said Tuesday.

Jon Valdez, who trained Beijing Olympic bronze medalist Justin Spring, resigned as an assistant coach from the Illinois men’s team on Oct. 17.

“I can’t go into the details of his resignation other than to say he was undergoing some serious personal issues, and that was one of them,” said attorney Lance Northcutt of Chicago, who is not representing Valdez in the DWI case.

Court records from Waukesha County in Wisconsin indicate the 39-year-old Valdez was charged with operating while under the influence after a Sept. 18 arrest. He’s pleaded not guilty.

Someone who answered a call to Valdez’s cell phone Tuesday hung up and a real estate agent who answered the door at his Urbana home said he wasn’t there. The agent said she was showing the home, which is for sale.

Northcutt and university officials have declined to say whether the video camera investigation was a factor in Valdez’s resignation, which the attorney said was voluntary. University police hope to finish their investigation into the video camera by the end of the week and send it to Champaign County prosecutors, who would decide whether to file charges.

“Right now, no charges have been filed. And we have not been told by anyone that charges will be filed,” Northcutt said.

A student found the small wireless camera inside a locker Sept. 25, university police Lt. Roy Acree said. It was pointed out of the locker through a small opening and “would be able to capture images of people changing their clothes,” he said.

He declined to say which locker room the camera was in, other than that it wasn’t a room used by students outside the university’s athletics programs. Acree said the camera wasn’t transmitting images to a computer or over the Internet, but wouldn’t say whether investigators found any stored images.

Northcutt declined to discuss the investigation’s details.

“We are cooperating with the investigation, and will continue to cooperate as best as we can,” he said.

In the DWI case, Valdez was pulled over Sept. 18 by a Wisconsin state trooper in Brookfield, Wis., about 10 miles west of Milwaukee, according to the Waukesha County District Attorney’s office. A spokeswoman for the office said Valdez has no prior criminal record.

He pleaded not guilty on Oct. 20 and is due in court again on Nov. 17.

Attorney Christopher Strohbehn of Waukesha, Wis., is representing Valdez in that case. He didn’t immediately return a call for comment Tuesday.

Illinois head gymnastics coach Yoshi Hayasaki said Tuesday that he didn’t think Valdez resigned over the arrest, but referred further questions to Assistant Athletic Director Kent Brown. Brown declined to comment on the resignation.

Valdez had been on the Illini coaching staff since 2000 and is Spring’s personal coach. He accompanied Spring to the Beijing Olympics, where the U.S. men won the bronze medal.

Efforts to reach Spring and several members of the Illinois men’s team Tuesday by telephone and e-mail were not successful.

“USA Gymnastics will follow the progress of this investigation and address the issue accordingly,” USA Gymnastics President Steve Penny said.

On April 25, the UI announced Valdez had been promoted from assistant coach and would succeed Hayasaki as head coach when Hayasaki retired following the 2008-09 season. The university now says it is looking for an assistant to replace Valdez.

Associated Press National Writer Nancy Armour contributed to this report from Chicago.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

Santa Fe Opera settles suit over wrong-way crash

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Posted on 23rd October 2008 by gjohnson in Uncategorized

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Date: 10/23/2008 7:14 PM

SANTA FE, N.M. (AP) _ The Santa Fe Opera and the estate of an employee have reached a settlement with relatives of a family killed in a drunken, wrong-way interstate crash triggered by the worker, who was returning from a business trip.

The attorney for the opera, Michael W. Brennan, characterized the settlements reached this year as “substantial” but said the exact amount is confidential.

Opera employee Dana Papst drove the wrong way on Interstate 25 south of Santa Fe in November 2006 and crashed into a minivan. He died the next morning.

The crash also killed the van’s driver, Paul Gonzales of Las Vegas, N.M.; his wife, Renee Collins-Gonzales and three of their children. Arissa Garcia, then 15, survived.

Tests showed Papst’s blood-alcohol content was four times the legal limit for driving.

Papst had been seen drinking on a US Airways flight to Albuquerque that day, and other passengers said he appeared to be drunk.

Police have said that after the flight landed, Papst bought a six-pack of beer in Bernalillo and drove north, eventually turning off the northbound lanes and driving the wrong way for five miles before striking the van.

The opera’s insurance company chose to settle the case rather than go to trial.

Court records show that Ever Ready Oil Co., Chevron Redi-Mart in Bernalillo and US Airways remain defendants in the lawsuit.

The state Department of Public Safety cited the Chevron Redi-Mart after the crash. The store, which later closed, was owned by Ever Ready Oil.

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Information from: The Santa Fe New Mexican, http://www.sfnewmexican.com


Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

NY county alters internet DWI ‘Wall of Shame’

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Posted on 22nd October 2008 by gjohnson in Uncategorized

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Date: 10/22/2008 5:14 AM

By FRANK ELTMAN
Associated Press Writer

MINEOLA, N.Y. (AP) _ Motorists charged with drunken driving will no longer be depicted on Nassau County’s internet “Wall of Shame” in light of a judge’s ruling that posting the arrests on a Web site violates due process.

County Executive Tom Suozzi insists the county is within its rights to distribute the names and photographs of accused drunken drivers but said Tuesday he would wait until suspects are convicted before listing them on the Internet.

Attorneys who represent accused drunken drivers said that is still not acceptable and punishes people beyond what state statutes allow.

Suozzi’s announcement came a day after state Supreme Court Judge William LaMarca ruled that announcing the drunken driving arrests before a suspect has a chance to make his case in court violates due process rights.

The judge’s ruling applied only to an individual who sued over the policy, but Suozzi conceded it is likely to invite additional lawsuits.

Although he plans to appeal the ruling, Suozzi said the county will now only list those convicted of DWI-related crimes after a trial or plea bargain.

Holding up newspapers trumpeting the arrest of New York Yankees star pitcher Joba Chamberlain on suspected drunken driving charges last weekend in Nebraska, Suozzi took issue with LaMarca’s ruling that the Web site creates “limitless and eternal notoriety.” He said he fails to see a difference between publication in a newspaper or the Internet.

“The objective of what we’re trying to do here is to change the culture that exists related to drunk driving, that it’s not just a socially acceptable crime,” Suozzi said.

The county initiated the Wall of Shame effort last Memorial Day weekend after a highway patrol officer who had stopped one suspected drunken driver on the Long Island Expressway was struck and seriously injured by a second driver, also suspected of being under the influence.

Since Memorial Day, about 1,400 drivers accused of being under the influence of alcohol have appeared on the county’s Web site. Police officials also said DWI-related arrests are up 6 percent over the same period a year ago.

Brian Griffin, an attorney who represented the person who sued the county, said the revised policy still violates state law. Griffin contends that if Suozzi wants to list convicted drunken drivers on the Web site, he will need legislative approval.

He cited a 1995 state Court of Appeals ruling that found a judge was wrong to order a repeat drunken driver to display a “CONVICTED DWI” license plate.

In that ruling, the state’s highest court said: “While innovative ideas to address the serious problem of recidivist drunk driving are not to be discouraged, the courts must act within the limits of their authority and cannot overreach by using their probationary powers to accomplish what only the legislative branch can do.”

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On the Net:

http://www.nassaucountyny.gov

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.

NY congressman convicted of drunken driving

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Posted on 18th October 2008 by gjohnson in Uncategorized

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Date: 10/17/2008 9:11 PM

By DEVLIN BARRETT
Associated Press Writer

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) _ Rep. Vito Fossella was convicted Friday of drunken driving in suburban Virginia, another blow from a late-night traffic stop that exposed secrets of his personal life and wrecked his career.

After a daylong trial at Alexandria General District Court, Judge Becky Moore found Fossella guilty of driving under the influence when he was pulled over for running a red light shortly after midnight on May 1. The arrest led to revelations that he had fathered a child from an extramarital affair, and he decided not to seek re-election. Fossella, New York City’s only Republican congressman, was first elected to the House in 1997.

The judge said she would hold a hearing Dec. 8 to determine if prosecutors had met the legal threshold for high blood alcohol content, which would mean a mandatory five-day jail sentence.

Crying friends hugged Fossella in the courtroom after the verdict.

“Don’t worry. It’ll be OK,” he told them.

The congressman declined to speak to reporters as he left the courthouse but issued a statement saying he was grateful the trial gave “an honest and straightforward account” of the events.

“I made a serious mistake and I want to again apologize for setting the wrong example,” he said. “I believe we live in a nation of laws, that no one person is above the law and I look forward to the judge’s final determination in December.”

Fossella’s day in court featured hours of dry, technical testimony, but also talk about a White House party, an Intoxilyzer 5000 breath-test machine and the congressman’s bowels.

The afternoon before his arrest, Fossella had been at the White House celebrating the New York Giants’ Super Bowl victory, but witnesses insisted no alcohol was served or consumed there.

Later, he went to dinner with friends where he had “no more than a glass and a half” of wine, he testified, plus a few more sips at a tavern.

Police officer Jamie Gernatt said he stopped Fossella’s car that night for running a red light, and the driver, Fossella, appeared to be drunk.

“There was a strong odor of alcoholic beverage coming from the car and his lips were stained red,” Gernatt testified. The police officer said Fossella told him he’d had two or three glasses of wine, but had bloodshot eyes and made mistakes in sobriety tests.

Police say his blood-alcohol content level was 0.17 percent, more than twice the legal limit, and under state law anyone convicted of having a BAC above 0.15 must serve a mandatory five-day jail term.

In announcing her verdict, the judge said she would hear arguments on that issue later.

Through the day’s evidence, Fossella listened glumly but intently to the evidence. At one point, he looked incredulous as Gernatt described one of their conversations on the night of the arrest, but otherwise he showed little reaction.

Another officer, Richard Sandoval, described strange behavior by Fossella when he was brought to a police station to submit to a breath test by the Intoxilyzer 5000.

At one point, according to Sandoval, Fossella asked to go to the bathroom and was told he couldn’t. At that point, the congressman said he would have to defecate in the room.

Sandoval said he told Fossella they were “guests” at the police station, and “he wasn’t going to defecate” in it.

On the witness stand, the congressman denied the story, saying that the officer had yelled at him and mocked him at times during the breath testing.

Defense lawyer Jerry Phillips challenged the types of field sobriety tests given to Fossella and spent hours trying to prove the Intoxilyzer 5000 machine gave bad readings due to interference from police radios and because Fossella used a hand sanitizer.

The judge rejected a defense claim the first officer had no grounds to arrest Fossella.

Police said the married 43-year-old told them when he was pulled over that he was headed to see his sick daughter. Given that his wife and children live in New York, that statement set off alarms and eventually led to the revelation he had secretly fathered a daughter, now 3 years old, with a Virginia woman, Laura Fay, a former Air Force officer and congressional liaison.

After admitting the relationship, Fossella announced he would not seek re-election, a drastic fall for a politician once viewed as a potential mayor of New York City. His downfall has also created an opportunity for Democrats to gain a seat in Congress in November.

Fossella’s troubles have only further hurt his state party’s election chances next month. If a Democrat wins Fossella’s seat, it will mark the first time in 35 years that all of New York City has been represented by Democrats.

Copyright 2008 The Associated Press.
Summary