Update on Sarah Ehekircher Case at U.S. Center for SafeSport
U.S. Center for SafeSport’s PR Spear Carrier, Dan Hill, Is Straight Out of the USA Swimming Troll-the-Critics Playbook
August 6, 2018U.S. Center for SafeSport’s Con Man PR Contractor Told Me His Employees ‘Would Never Lie For Me.’ So Far, He’s Right About That.
August 8, 2018by Irvin Muchnick
Kathleen Smith, the U.S. Center for SafeSport investigator of Sarah Ehekircher’s complaint of grooming and abuse by her teen swim coach Scott MacFarland — and of USA Swimming’s corrupt processing of the complaint at the beginning of the “safe sport” era in 2010 — has emerged from a two-month-plus disappearing act in this case.
And Smith emerges with a new title. Previously the SafeSport Center’s “senior investigator,” she now goes by “Director of Intake and Program Services.”
This lifts Smith into a tie in title switches with Michael Henry, her co-architect of the disgraceful May 24 initial meeting with Ehekircher. Smith and Henry turned the meeting into an ambush interrogation — lying in advance about the role of Henry, who was then “Director of Legal Affairs,” and audiotaping the session without a lawyer for the complainant present. After Concussion Inc. and Deadspin reported on Henry’s peculiar peregrinations, he became known as the center’s “Director, Investigations & Outcomes.”
On July 31, the new DOIAPS, Smith, reintroduced herself on email to Ehekircher, whom she had ghosted all through June and July, with the message, “The Center is nearing a resolution of the matter and wanted to reach out prior to doing so.” Smith invited Ehekircher to a second interview and the opportunity to submit additional materials related to her complaint.
Some of those additional materials remain hostage to discussions between Ehekircher and USA Swimming following her recent meetings with Tim Hinchey, that group’s CEO, and Liz Hahn, the coordinator of safe sport. Ehekircher and her lawyer are trying to pry loose not just the transcript of an outrageously skewed 2010 National Board of Review hearing, which was finally released, but also all the background information Ehekircher had submitted prior to the meeting, which remains in USA Swimming’s possession.
Complete chronological leaks to the background of the Sarah Ehekircher case: https://concussioninc.net/?p=13125