Commish Drops Hammer on Saints Players

[shally]

Originally Posted by akhhorus

The NFL evidence leak begins:

Link



(snip)

John Dean, Robert Haldeman, Robert Erlichman all blinking on hold for Williams

Clark Colson sending smoke signals from above...

People learn nothing from the past.. the cover up is always worse than the original crime

[BIGREDSKINSFAN1963]

wonder how long it will be before vilma,fujita,and the other guys sue the saints,vitt and greg williams claiming they were forced into it?

[shally]

Originally Posted by BIGREDSKINSFAN1963

wonder how long it will be before vilma,fujita,and the other guys sue the saints,vitt and greg williams claiming they were forced into it?

one great big circular firing squad, IMHO.. no one comes out of this looking good

[cal_junior]

[akhhorus]

Originally Posted by cal_junior

He's also suing Goodell for "defamation." Good luck with that.

[cal_junior]

Originally Posted by akhhorus

He's also suing Goodell for "defamation." Good luck with that.

Somebody should sue him for using that many capital letters in a tweet. Yeesh.

[akhhorus]

Originally Posted by cal_junior

Somebody should sue him for using that many capital letters in a tweet. Yeesh.

If I was trying to save what little left was in my career, I guess I would have to caps lock button handy also.

[PyroGenic]

This should at least put the evidence on the table

[akhhorus]

Originally Posted by PyroGenic

This should at least put the evidence on the table

Maybe, but I doubt this goes to trial ever. Smells like Vilma is just playing in the court of public opinion. The league will have to reveal its proof during his grievance hearing in a couple weeks. And since Vilma is a public figure, its almost impossible to win this suit.

[AustinSkin]

I've gotta believe the evidence is damning. There's no way you suspend a player for a year without indisputable evidence. And it won't be hearsay.

[akhhorus]

http://sports.yahoo.com/news/nfl--so...y-scandal.html

Two sources with knowledge of the NFL's evidence in the New Orleans Saints bounty scandal said Friday that the league has a copy of a "ledger" that was kept detailing weekly earnings for players.

The ledger, which shows both money earned for "cart-offs" and "whacks" and deducted for "mental errors," also points to the fact that players were told on a week-by-week basis of their performance.


According to sources, the NFL showed portions of the ledger during meetings with some of those who have been investigated in the scandal.

"The players clearly knew what was going each week with the payments," a source told Yahoo! Sports. In fact, multiple sources admitted that Saints defensive players would regularly encourage teammates to put money earned from the bounty system back into the pool. It's unclear if that was to increase the potential winnings or eventually use the money for some other purpose.

Idiots. Even stupider is the dumbest possible quote from the NFLPA spokesman:

I guess it either qualifies as evidence

[BIGREDSKINSFAN1963]

If the league has the ledgers,what is stopping the government or the NOPD or even the state police in louisiana from seizing it and charging a bunch of former and current saints players and coaches with assault?Saints have been dirty in the front office ever since payton got there.remember the big drug deal a few years back with the saints trainer who was stealing and selling vicodin?
as more of this stuff gets leaked,you may see the law step in and start questioning folks,players and coaches,maybe even goodell and tom benson.

[justinskins]

Originally Posted by BIGREDSKINSFAN1963

If the league has the ledgers,what is stopping the government or the NOPD or even the state police in louisiana from seizing it and charging a bunch of former and current saints players and coaches with assault?

Probably the law is making them hesitate. Tort law, for example, gives more leeway to players in contact sports than to other people. Why? Because players have consented to a certain amount of contact by agreeing to play (or, to put it another way. In most jurisdictions, the contact must not only be a violation of the rules, but a flagrant violation. A good example was Hackbart v. Cincinnati Bengals, in which one player intentionally hit a DB in the back of the head while he was kneeling in the endzone. On the other hand, at least one court has held that beaning a batter, although intentional and against the rules, is part of the game of baseball and not tortious. In other words, the violation must be beyond not only the rules, but the expected way of playing the game to lead to tort liability. It could be that evidence of a specific intent to injure another player may overcome this requirement that the plaintiff show a flagrant violation, but I'm skeptical.

Tort law is different from criminal law, and one of the important differences is that consent and assumption of the risk are not defenses to criminal battery or assault. However, courts still are going to give more leeway in battery or assault cases involving sports. My knowledge of the law here is not as strong. My intuition is that you'd need evidence of a serious violation of the rules, not just a borderline penalty (e.g. you'd have to show that the DE did more than hit the quarterback a little too late or a little too high). Once again, however, the question is whether evidence of an intent to injure would make a lesser violation of the rules criminal. I just don't know.

I'm mostly thinking aloud, but at the very least there would be some tricky legal issues involved in bringing the case you've described. Moreover, prosecutors may be inclined to let the sport police itself rather than getting involved (absent, once again, a truly flagrant or heinous act).

[BIGREDSKINSFAN1963]

i understand that there is a bit of give and take with respect to the tort law,but remember when the guy hit the other guy in the head with a hockey stick during a game? he got taken to jail after the game,but the charge was eventually thrown out.I Still think there could be a court case made for tax evasion or a conspiracy when you kept a ledger and motivated players to take out other players beyond the scope of the game.don't think it will happen though.

[justinskins]

Originally Posted by BIGREDSKINSFAN1963

i understand that there is a bit of give and take with respect to the tort law,but remember when the guy hit the other guy in the head with a hockey stick during a game? he got taken to jail after the game,but the charge was eventually thrown out.I Still think there could be a court case made for tax evasion or a conspiracy when you kept a ledger and motivated players to take out other players beyond the scope of the game.don't think it will happen though.

Tax evasion maybe (though it seems pretty trifling given that the amounts at stake were fractions of the salaries of everyone involved). On conspiracy, you have the same problem as before: was what they agreed to do actually a crime?