Tuesday Night Notes on the Exploding George Gibney / USA Swimming Story on Two Continents

* Following Irish Independent TD (member of Parliament) Maureen O’Sullivan’s appeal to the justice ministry to reopen the George Gibney criminal case and seek his extradition from Florida, and the report on O’Sullivan’s initiative in the Irish Times (where Gibney was identified only as “a ‘notorious’ swimming coach accused of multiple cases of sex abuse who was granted a visa to live in the United States”), there was more coverage in the Irish news media. O’Sullivan and journalist Justine McCarthy of the Sunday Times of London discussed the case on Ireland TV3’s Tonight With Vincent Browne. They also talked about how the case had been revived by Concussion Inc.’s Freedom of Information Act request to the Department of Homeland Security for release of Gibney’s immigration records. We will try to find a video file or stream of the Browne program.

* The other Irish journalist who deserves historical credit for bringing the Gibney abuses to light is Johnny Watterson of the Irish Times. Today he emailed us, in part: “After [Gibney] left Scotland (Warrander SC) he went to Colorado. I contacted the police there and they claim to have carried out a back ground check with regard to his Green Card. The police officer  I spoke to … told me they checked everything but that it was all in order. I was led to believe the club was frequented by police officers and their families. She did not know where he went to when he left. I guess they ran him out of town….”

* The officer to whom Watterson referred was Sergeant Jo Ann Rzeppa, now retired. The Arcada police declined our effort to forward a message to Rzeppa (who also has not responded to a message sent to her apparent Facebook account). The Wheat Ridge police promised to contact their own retired detective on the Gibney case, Lila Cohen, to see if she would speak with us, but we have not yet heard back.

* Late today an Arvada police spokesperson said Rzeppa’s 1995 report on Gibney would not be released to us “because the case involves a juvenile and allegations of sexual assault.” We question the legitimacy of that response, since many state information statutes provide for simply redacting the names and identifying details of minor victims or alleged victims. We are asking Arvada for clarification of this point, and we are also doing further legal research. (Readers with knowledge of the Colorado law are invited to contact us at [email protected].) In addition, we’ve asked Arvada if the “allegations of sexual assault” are the same as the earlier reported investigation of Gibney “possibly pinching (or snapping the swimsuit of) a North Jeffco swimmer.”

CONCUSSION INC.’S SERIES SO FAR:

Why Is George Gibney — No. 1 At-Large Pedophile in Global Sports — Living in Florida? And Who Sponsored His Green Card?