A former high-level volleyball player has sued the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) for violating its own regulations by allowing a prominent coach and alleged sexual predator to coach a girls’ volleyball team at the recent AAU national volleyball championships in Orlando. The alleged abuse of the player involving Coach Rick Butler took place more than 30 years ago.
“To this day, despite knowing that Butler sexually molested the plaintiff and other minor girls who were volleyball players on his teams, the AAU still allows Butler to coach junior girls’ volleyball teams where he has unsupervised contact with and power over minor girls,” according to the complaint.
The latest action is part of a trend in which former athletes seek redress from organizations that could and should have done more to prevent ongoing abuse. And no one has been more at the forefront of this movement then former Olympic Gold Medalist Nancy Hogshead-Makar, who is an attorney and a former victim of abuse during her swimming career.
Hogshead-Makar’s efforts led the USOC, on July 10, 2014, to announce that it would create a separate entity to investigate and sanction sexual abuse. Then in February 2015, the USOC announced the “Safe Sport Advisory Council” (http://www.teamusa.org/Media/News/USOC/USOC-announces-formation-of-US-Center-for-Safe-Sport-Advisory-Council). Finally, in January 2016, the USOC announced a “Safe Sport Board of Directors” http://www.teamusa.org/Media/News/USOC/USOC-announces-US-Center-for-Safe-Sport-board-of-directors. However, “since I took the pressure off, the USOC has stalled … two years and no new entity as announced,” Hogshead-Makar told Sports Litigation Alert.
The Volleyball Lawsuit
The 10-page lawsuit targeting the AAU was filed by the Weil Quaranta law firm in Orange County Circuit Court. It seeks compensatory damages and relief for Sarah Powers-Barnhard, of Ponte Vedra Beach, Fla., a former player for Butler and a fellow coach at the aforementioned national championships.
The suit alleges that she was one of several victims of Butler’s while he was her coach from 1982 to 1984. She went on to a distinguished career as a player and coach, but the suit says she has been treated for depression as a direct result of Butler’s abuse.
The suit alleges that the plaintiff “is unable to shepherd her team to a national title without having to see and/or be in contact with Butler — her sexual abuser.”
Further, it alleged that Butler was banned 1995 from USA Volleyball-sanctioned or sponsored events, “though he was readmitted to serve in a restricted administrative capacity five years later. The Team USA Girls’ National Volleyball Championship is taking place in Indianapolis through Sunday, July 3, where he is performing supervisory duties but not coaching.
The two-count suit — Sarah Powers-Barnhard v. Amateur Athletic Union of the United States, 9th Judicial Circuit, Orange County, Fla., Case No. 43146151 — alleges violation of Florida’s Unfair Trade and Deceptive Practices Act, and negligence.
The suit cites the AAU’s Children Protection Handbook barring membership to people accused of sexual misconduct. The lawsuit cites the AAU’s handbook’s statement that, “an imbalance of power is always assumed between a coach and an athlete.” The suit alleges the AAU, “deceptively promotes the organization’s policy to deny participation in the AAU to any individual for whom there is reasonable cause to believe that they engaged in sexual misconduct.”
The lawsuit reads: “Butler was able, by virtue of his unique authority and position as one of the leading volleyball coaches in the United States, to identify vulnerable victims to sexually abuse; to manipulate his authority to procure compliance with his sexual demands from his victims; to induce victims to continue to allow the abuse; and to coerce his victims to not report the sexual abuse to any other persons or authorities. Butler is now able to re-inflict those injuries on the plaintiff at each tournament.”
The law firm noted in a separate demand letter delivered to the AAU: “We remain baffled as to how this set of circumstances has come to be: a coach having been found through due process to have molested children is now competing against his victims in AAU sanctioned events. None of these facts were buried but rather broadly publicized in 1995 and again in 2015.”
Hogshead-Maker credited the law firm with “suing under the Florida Deceptive and Unfair Trade Practices Act,” calling it “a creative approach,” since it blocks a defense that the statute of limitations had expired.
Hogshead-Makar added that USA Volleyball, a National Governing Body under the USOC umbrella, “should be coordinating the list of those banned from the sport with other sports organizations, like the AAU, the NCAA, NJCAA, the High School Athletic Associations, etc.”
