Up until recently, Anderson had been involved as an assistant coach with the Capitol Electric team in the Burlingame Youth Baseball Association in the San Francisco Bay Area.

However, a parent filed a complaint about his involvement in the BALCO scandal, thereby casting doubt on the league’s judgment which ultimately led to his exclusion from the field.

Convicted of dealing steroids, Anderson is purported to have supplied home run champion Barry Bonds and other major league players with performance enhancing drugs.

During the Bonds trial, Anderson refused to testify on the stand about the major league slugger’s steroid usage. The court, unimpressed with his resistance, rewarded Anderson with three weeks in jail.

Up until the present season, league president Mike Brunicardi said that there had been no complaints about Anderson but in light of the recent situation, he will be prohibited from being out on the field during games.

“Anderson is free to register as a coach next season, but will have to undergo a background check like other volunteers.”

While it’s unlikely we’d see him dealing steroids to 12-year olds, Anderson has a lot of past mistakes to account for. If he chooses to register as a coach, there will be some explaining on his part when his background report comes back.

Peters Township Parks and Recreation will now level a $500 fine against any organization or group, which cannot provide documentation their coaches, have undergone a criminal background check with the Pennsylvania State Police.

The Peters Township council passed a 2006 ordinance requiring the background checks. If anyone thought they could blow off the background screening process before, perhaps a hit to their wallet might make them think otherwise.

Michelle Harmel, Director of Peters Township Parks and Recreation Department, said, “The difficulty hasn’t been with getting people to get their clearances, but it’s been difficult to achieve 100 percent compliance with the policy.”

Nine separate sporting organizations presently make use of the fields and 100 percent compliance has been somewhat of an elusive maintained standard.

Some of the sports groups have had difficulty getting coaches to take the time to have the background screenings conducted. Some of the other organizations have simply been unreachable despite multiple outreach attempts.

“They tell us that their coaches are volunteers and it’s hard to get them to do the background checks,” she said. “Short of saying it’s inconvenient for them, it’s what we are being told.”

And it’s not as though Peters Township has made the screening process an ugly maze of time-consuming red tape. Temporary certifications are available for coaches and volunteers online through the Pennsylvania State Police while the main security clearance is processed.

Requirements across the various sports groups and organizations are inconsistent, with some calling for proper clearances for coaches while others apparently don’t have any such requirements on the books.

We all know about the potential negative consequences when sports clubs and athletic associations fail to properly screen coaches and volunteers. If it takes monetary fines to wake people up to the importance of background screening then so be it.

However, this promising young athlete was almost thrown off track in 2010 she began developing a relationship with her travel team coach which began to move into inappropriate territory.

Just 17 years old at the time, Chelsea became involved with 39 year old Ronald Figueroa to a point where her identity and sense of direction became blurred in the face of something beyond her experience.

“I don’t know how he did it, but I completely changed. He made me believe that he really cared for me and that he wasn’t going to hurt me and he used that to his own power to get me to basically do anything.”

The relationship between the two started innocently enough but when the travel coach began to press her for sex, the young softball prodigy knew the situation had taken a turn for the worse.

As in many other situations of this sort, Chelsea thought that bring the issue to the attention of her parents or the school might jeopardize her chances for a college scholarship and other opportunities.

“This was all about softball. I didn’t want to get kicked off the team because all I wanted in the end was a college scholarship.”

Despite being preyed upon, Chelsea would not remain silent over what had been done to her.

After going to her parents with the news, the police were called in and Ronald Figueroa learned the hard way what happens when you betray the trust and security of a impressionable young person.

Since the incident, Chelsea has gone to lead her softball team to the Florida statewide final four and had recently signed to play for George Washington University where she’ll begin playing for the D.C. school in Fall of 2011.

Chelsea is also taking her story to the Florida state capitol to emphasize the need for stricter guidelines and regulations governing individuals who want to coach kids and teenagers.

“We need to know who’s coaching our kids. We need them to have background checks.”

Chelsea knows it will likely be a long process to change the way travel team coaches are screened but she is more than willing to undertake the effort if it will help prevent other players from experiencing what she did.

If anything she wants one message to get out as far and wide as possible to other players:

“”It is OK to tell, and it’s better. It helps a lot of people.”

Jimmy Cruz stands accused of gunning down J.J. Revear the week of May 16^th, 2011, capping a long history of criminal entanglement for a man who, for some reason, was still able to coach youth league football players.

Due to an overlooked background check, Cruz had been coaching for over five years with the Mid-Florida Football and Cheerleading Conference.

Up until recently, Cruz had been working as a coach with the Tampa Bay Panthers. Known for his dedication, he could be found posing in group photos with a number of teams, players unaware of their coach’s checkered past.

His past convictions included distributing cocaine within 1,000 feet of a school, soliciting prostitution, aggravated assault, battery on a law enforcement officer among 19 other charges and various convictions going back to 1996.

This man, on the field, coaching youth football? How?

With its ranks composed upwards of 4,000 kids, the Tampa Bay Youth Football league requires its 1,500 volunteers to undergo a $20 background check prior to working within the league.

League President, Scott Levinson, explained specific offenses are not tolerated regardless of a volunteer’s earnestness or commitment to helping out.

“If you were arrested for DUI eight years ago, I don’t think that’s going to hurt you coaching a child,” said Levinson. “But if you were arrested for drugs or distribution … that’s a different story. Anything dealing with domestic violence, anything dealing with a child, anything sexual, you’re done.”

According to those type of standards, Cruz would have never set foot on the field had a check been conducted. Drugs, prostitution and shooting charges don’t exactly make for the type of moral character a young player can look to for inspiration.

Parks and Recreation Department spokesperson, Linda Carlo, said an investigation is presently underway concerning Cruz’s role within the league and the circumstances behind the missing background check.

The negligence behind the criminal history oversight could possibly result in sanctions for the team and the league. Both entities are likely kicking themselves pretty good at this point for being asleep at the switch.

Even if an individual on the field has your trust and a good reputation to carry them onward in good graces, you just can’t risk the chance there might be more than meets the eye.

Run a background check; know for sure who you’re dealing with and field qualified individuals.

Fenimore is being held on $420,000 bail.

It’s common for coaches to look for ways to bond with their players and establish a unique camaraderie between two separate generations. However, as one volunteer coach has found out, providing marijuana to young players isn’t as smart as say, taking the team out for pizza.

St. Helens Oregon volunteer baseball coach Randy Fenimore has been charged with 6 counts each of unlawful delivery of marijuana and endangering the welfare of a minor.

The charges stem from an overnight team excursion on April 9^th in which Fenimore allegedly distributed pot to his players. The team had taken the outing to cope with the loss of head coach Tim Lokken, 51, who had died the day before.

St. Helens Police Sgt. Phil Edwards stated, “It seemed to be a spur-of-the-moment idea brought up by one individual. Fenimore was present during the conversation and did nothing to discourage (the use of marijuana).”

Authorities are also mulling whether criminal charges will be brought against six other players who brought supplementary amount of “green” party favors of their own to the event.

The St. Helens School district policy is to run a background check on all volunteers, faculty and employees. However, the district had no comment to offer up when it was disclosed Fenimore had a 2009 citation for marijuana possession in which he had pled guilty and paid out hundreds of dollars in fines.

Look, you want to connect with your players, deliver a motivating talk, surprise them with a case of ice cold Coca-Cola or surprise them with an unexpected detour to the McDonalds drive-thru. I don’t think hooking them up with drugs is going to have any kind of a positive ending.

Exactly why he thought he this was a cool thing to do is anyone’s guess, but with bail set at $420,000, Mr. Fenimore can mull it over while he sits in a St. Helens jail awaiting trial.

Would you ever associate an alleged Colombo crime family associate with a little league game?

Currently out on $500,000 bail, Colandra stands accused of lying about his participation and knowledge in the shootings of John Minerva, a Colombo crime family soldier as well as an associate of Minerva’s during an inner-city, family civil war back in 1992.

Colandra stated that he is just interested in remaining a figure in his son’s life, nothing more. Brooklyn Judge Raymond Reyes was sympathetic to Colandra’s request to spend time on Mondays and Sundays coaching his sons team citing, “Little league is sacred.”

“He’s doing a very kind act and in no way should other people be concerned about their safety.” stated Paul Nadden, acting defense attorney for Colandra.

This writer isn’t so sure how comfortable he would feel if a man involved in a gangland killing and the subject of an ongoing criminal investigation was coaching little league baseball. Since it’s been implied that even little league is sacred for suspected mobsters, I guess that makes it okay?

It might not make the most comfortable situation for some parents, but ultimately it’s their decision to pull their kids from the team if they feel Colandra’s presence means danger for their children.

But a special report by Sports Illustrated.com brought to light how a lack of background screening in many schools’ football programs is placing individuals with a propensity for violent and criminal behavior on the playing fields and college campuses.

The phenomenon of crime in college football might not be new, but recent years have seen an increase in high profile arrests that have people asking where the necessary safeguards are? Shouldn’t a sports team have the same background checks in place like an employer?

Schools like the University of Pittsburgh (which had the highest rate of players in trouble in 2010 with 22 players charged) have thus had to reevaluate the manner in which they screen individuals. In many cases, athletic department evaluations of players’ potential criminal histories have been nonexistent or waived altogether

The University of Pittsburgh found itself forced to initiate a new “evaluation policy” after an incident in September, 2010 in which a freshman defensive back struck a female acquaintance.

In fact, 2010 saw a string of violent crimes perpetrated by Pittsburgh players that involved aggravated assault, resisting arrest, battery and, in one case, a man thrown a plate glass window during an incident at an art gallery

In a statement released by the University, the new player evaluation process stops short of being a straightforward criminal background check and reveals that it is more of a psychological questionnaire:

“This evaluation is not a legal criminal background check. Rather, it is a checklist of questions that attempts to gain greater knowledge of the behavior and citizenship of an individual prospect from a variety of people.”

Given the string of violent offenses committed by University of Pittsburgh players) it seems like the school would make more of an effort to screen players in the form of a fully qualified criminal background check.

The University of Pittsburgh is just one of many schools contending with athlete delinquency issues. Sports Illustrated revealed their findings of a study conducted of 25 total 2010 pre-season teams which pulled back the curtain on the clean cut image of the aspiring athletic champion:

• 40% of 277 uncovered incidents involved assault and battery (25 cases), domestic violence (6), robbery (4), aggravated assault (4), and sex offenses (4)
• 105 offenses involved drugs and alcohol, DUI offenses and drug possession.
• Of the 277 known criminal cases with substantiated outcomes, 60% of the players charged either pleaded guilty or paid some type of penalty charge.

NCAA President Mark Emmert stated, “It is a set of facts that obviously should concern all of us. You certainly don’t want a large number of people with criminal backgrounds involved in activities that represent the NCAA.”

No one wants someone who represents a criminal liability scoring the winning touchdown and then punching out their significant other after the game. But the flip side is that no coach or athletic department will want to initiate any sort of hiring conditions that would discourage a star player from choosing another school.

Sports Illustrated contacted several collegiate coaches and asked why they might not probe their players for past criminal issues. Some seemed daunted by the difficulty of juvenile criminal record availability, while others seemed to rely on former high school coaches or existing records maintained by the school system.

Said Ohio State Coach Jim Tressel, “Hopefully, through the school system we can find out just what we need.”

“Hopefully” however does not sound very reassuring. Privacy laws can make passing information along from one institution to another difficult or even impossible. Information coaches are hoping to get might not ever arrive and, given the fast pace of the sport itself, many coaches may simply waive the need to run a background screening aside in favor of getting a star player onto the roster.

However, universities simply cannot keep turning a blind eye or doling out free passes to players whose behavior is more suited to a penitentiary than the 40 yard line.   

Richard Lapchick, the Center for Sport in Society founder and CEO of the National Consortium for Academics and Sports at the University of Central Florida, is aware of escalation of off-field incidents and what they might spell for the future of the sport:

 ”This sounds an alarm bell that some new policies are going to have to be developed on individual campuses or at the national level to take a closer look at who we’re recruiting to our campuses. I think it’s almost incumbent on all those universities who play at this level to do criminal background checks on the people they’re recruiting. Not only for the nature of the football program itself, but for public safety on campus.”

It’s unfair to assume that all players will abuse their position given the opportunity. We can’t forget that college sports programs have helped turn people’s lives around and helped them shed a troubled past. Many coaches have seen troubled individuals turn into upstanding people capable of leading by example through honest and upstanding behavior on and off the field.

It can all start by educating schools and coaches in a uniform manner how background checks work, reasons for running them and their effectiveness in helping prevent liability. There would bring about a greater willingness to address crime in college football and develop screening solutions tailored to the needs of individual schools, while respecting the need for public safety both on and off campus.

Hartshorn is alleged to have sexually assaulted the victims who ranged from 13 to 14 years of age at his home between July of 2009 and January 2011. A raid on his home by police uncovered a disgusting trove of child porn material and movies…some of which supposedly feature some of the young players that frequented Hartshorne’s home. Additional details too chilling for us to recap can be found in the
NY Daily News article.

Neighbors described young boys at Hartshorn’s home as pretty typical sight, one which wasn’t given much of a second thought.

“It was just like they lived there.” said neighbor Wanda Harris. “I’m totally blown away, I’m flabbergasted”

Ms. Harris and fellow neighbors are not the only ones shocked by the fact a predator of this caliber was living in their community. Hartshorn was briefly employed as the campaign manager for Alan Gerson, a former Manhattan Councilman who made a failed bid for reelection.

During the campaign, Hartshorn has enlisted the aid of several kids to hand out election literature and candidate information. It is unknown if any of the kids employed by Hartshorne at the time were victimized but working with someone like him is bad enough

Alan Gerson was shocked to learn of the former coaches history and found it hard to believe he had employed someone with a criminal record that includes child endangerment and sodomy.

“It just sickens me. It angers me. It’s not the David Hartshorn I knew. If this is all true, he led a complete double life.”

The final shocker is that Hartshorns history of sexual deviance was revealed by a swift and simple background check by authorities. Why a check was never run on him prior to placement in a position working with children is unknown as calls to the Rochadale Village Community center seeking comment were not returned. And apparently he slipped through the cracks as well working on Alan Gersons reelection campaign.

There are many reasons to screen your applicants and this particular episode where the Rochdale Village Little Leagues failure to properly execute a background check  is one of the more tragic examples. The addition of a extra layer in your hiring process in the form of a solid background check can hardly be considered an inconvenience when it ensures the safety of not only your employees but the people you serve.

These three were a part of a larger bust executed by Federal Agents in the Sacramento area in recent weeks. Online sting operations allowed agents to determine the identities of individuals possessing and distributing child pornography. This particular bust is more than a  little unsettling having included so many individuals whose primary occupations had them working with youth on a consistent basis.

 Background checks for coaches and youth oriented sports league volunteers have become more commonplace in recent years as incidents of harassment, abuse and exploitation have risen. The perpetrators are thus developing tactics to try to remain under the radar to avoid detection.

While background checks are an extremely effective method for preventing the wrong people from getting involved with children, parents also need to apply their own intuition and common sense, especially if they feel something is amiss.

Ken Rosenfeld, FOX40 legal analyst and veteran criminal defense lawyer says, “You have to as a parent involve yourself and watch. There’s always signs, some of them subliminal, some of them not. But there are always signs when someone seems a little too involved with children.”

One of the men arrested, Peter Graham, taught a Kenpo karate program to kids. While he had no criminal record, other red flags in plain view were a little hard to ignore.

Consider that at 29 years of age, he was still living at home with his mother. His Facebook page displayed photos of him at a Plumas Lake pool party frolicking with young boys in 2009.

Issues interacting with other adults? Check. Cause for suspicion if you are a parent? Check. Had my son or daughter been involved in this guys class they would have been pulled out quicker than Bruce Lee breaking a stack of concrete blocks.

While it is unlikely Peter Graham and company will be around kids anytime soon, it’s necessary to supplement your organizations background check policy with your own vigilance and good decision making ability. If you suspect something is amiss with your child’s sports mentor despite a clean background sweep, do not wait to vocalize your concern until it is too late.

Coach's future is up in smoke after his arrest for cultivating pot.

A former assistant football coach at Washington High School in Massillon County, Ohio finds his future up with the school “up in smoke” after being arrested in an investigation that netted over 300 marijuana plants being cultivated at two residences.

Former high school kicker and quarterback Brett Marshall was employed as a volunteer assistant coach at the high school up until his arrest. What has also come to light is that Marshall was also arrested in 2006 for another drug-related offense.

School policy dictates that assistant coaches, whether on a paid or volunteer basis, must submit to a background and then be certified before they can assume coaching duties on the field.

The checks conducted by the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigations would have definitely turned up Marshall’s 2006 arrest in which he was charged with a major and minor misdemeanor for permitting drug abuse.

“Assuming the clerk of courts submitted it, if the individual was arrested, booked and fingerprinted and that was sent to us, it would be returned.” said Ted Hart, a spokesman for the Ohio Attorney General’s Office.

So what exactly happened here? At this point, the story gets a little murky as to what went wrong. By all means, an offense of this sort should have disqualified Marshall right off the bat.

Reporters for CantonRep.com attempted to reach several high-ranking school district employees including Superintendant Lisa Carmichael, Assistant Superintendant Mark Fortner and the Security Administrator. Emails and phone calls were not returned.

What can be gathered then, is that this may have been a case of Marshall slipping under the radar. This blogger’s suspicions were aroused by the following statements from Board Member Marshall Weinberg:

“Brett’s name just showed up in a list of approving people,” Weinberg said. “He was nonpaid and had been there for a while.”

And the 2006 charge?

Without a doubt it would have raised a red flag in anybody’s mind,” he said. “These (coaches) are who’s around our kids. The safety of our kids is a prime concern on a daily basis.”

But surely the system would have caught him right?

“We fingerprint and do the whole thing,” he said.

Well, somewhere along the line there was a mix up because now the coach working directly with young students has been arrested for growing dope plants and not just a few for “medicinal purposes”.

You can’t just have a background system sitting there and expect it to work. If the Massillon School District wants to avoid another incident like this in the future, they should to take the background screening process a little more seriously.

X8PXWUWY9HPS