{"id":8750,"date":"2014-03-04T09:30:55","date_gmt":"2014-03-04T17:30:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/concussioninc.net\/?p=8750"},"modified":"2024-05-29T17:03:31","modified_gmt":"2024-05-30T01:03:31","slug":"search-for-fort-lauderdale-city-documents-widens-net-of-accountability-for-abusive-usa-swimming-coach-alex-pussieldi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/concussioninc.net\/?p=8750","title":{"rendered":"Search for Fort Lauderdale City Documents Widens Net of Accountability for Abusive USA Swimming Coach Alex Pussieldi"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\"><br \/>\n<html><body><i style=\"font-size: 13px;\">by Irvin Muchnick and Tim Joyce<\/i><\/p>\n<p><i>&nbsp;<\/i><\/p>\n<p>Fort Lauderdale city officials tell us they are looking high and low for 2004 and 2007 documents relating to accused monster swim coach Alex Pussieldi. The implications aren&rsquo;t pretty.<\/p>\n<p>Assistant city attorney Cole J. Copertino reiterated to us this morning that the city clerk and the City Commission office say &ldquo;no records have been identified that are responsive&rdquo; to our request for documents cited in a 2007 cover story in the <i>New Times <\/i>weekly of Broward and Palm Beach Counties.<\/p>\n<p>Copertino said the Fort Lauderdale Aquatic Complex is still looking for files relating to the 2004 pool deck and locker room attack on a Mexican swimmer by Pussieldi in 2004. That incident was reported to and investigated by the police, as well as by USA Swimming; it prompted Pussieldi&rsquo;s resignation from the Fort Lauderdale Swim Team of Hall of Fame coach Jack Nelson, who is also the accused rapist of open water swimming legend Diana Nyad.<\/p>\n<p>The salient point in all this is that none of the local complaints generated in 2004 and 2007 ended Alex Pussieldi&rsquo;s reign of terror in South Florida swimming &#8212; a chronology Concussion Inc. now has documented to go all the way up to an eyewitness allegation of abusive behavior by Pussieldi at a swim meet in Plantation, a Fort Lauderdale suburb, in November 2012.<\/p>\n<p>We have asked city official Copertino for comment on these three possibilities for why no 2007 records have yet been located:<\/p>\n<p>(a) The very detailed description in the&nbsp;<i>New Times&nbsp;<\/i>cover story was fabricated. We consider that highly unlikely. Here, in part, is what <em>New Times&#8217;<\/em>&nbsp;Ashley Harrell wrote:<\/p>\n<p><i>&nbsp;<\/i><\/p>\n<p><b>&#8230; [A] packet of materials that included a sworn statement by [Diana] Nyad, police reports, and news stories was mysteriously delivered to <\/b><b>Fort Lauderdale<\/b><b> city commissioners in January. The documents purport to show that Nelson and two other coaches that he hired and retained are guilty of sexual misconduct and other misdeeds.&#8221;<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b><i>&#8230;<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>The packet given to city commissioners paints an alarming picture of Nelson and some of the coaches he supervised.<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>In 2004, a swimmer in Nelson&acute;s program told <\/b><b>Fort Lauderdale<\/b><b> police that one of the coaches had child pornography on his computer and that the coach secretly videotaped male swimmers who lived with him as the swimmers undressed in a bathroom. The swimmer claimed he found a video camera hidden in an air conditioning vent. Another swimmer told police the same coach touched him inappropriately. According to the packet, Dillon told Nelson about the boys&acute; accusations, but Nelson did not go to police. Instead, Dillon&acute;s wife did. Fort Lauderdale police conducted an investigation, but it dead-ended when the coach denied the accusations. Nelson kept the coach on staff.<\/b><\/p>\n<p><b>The same documents describe another of Nelson&acute;s coaches, Cecil Russell, who admitted under oath in 1996 that he helped incinerate the dismembered remains of a murder victim&#8230;.<\/b><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><i style=\"font-size: 13px;\">New Times <\/i>editor-in-chief Chuck Strouse told us, &ldquo;The papers were absolutely not fabricated. Ashley Harrell&#8217;s piece was thoroughly researched and completely accurate.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>(b) Someone&nbsp;with the City Commission did not retain copies of the documents before forwarding them to the police. That would be less than diligent.<\/p>\n<p>(c) The papers were tossed. That would be, in our view,&nbsp;criminally negligent with respect to public safety. The records made reference to, among others, a sexual abuser and child pornographer still loose in the community and still working identical jobs as a coach in youth swimming.<\/p>\n<p><em style=\"font-size: 13px;\">Complete links to Concussion Inc.&rsquo;s Pussieldi investigation are at<a href=\"https:\/\/concussioninc.net\/?p=8652\">&nbsp;https:\/\/concussioninc.net\/?p=8652<\/a>.<\/em><br \/>\n<\/body><\/html><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Irvin Muchnick and Tim Joyce &nbsp; Fort Lauderdale city officials tell us they are looking high and low for 2004 and 2007 documents relating to<span class=\"excerpt-hellip\"> [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8750","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.8 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Search for Fort Lauderdale City Documents Widens Net of Accountability for Abusive USA Swimming Coach Alex Pussieldi - Concussion Inc. - Author Irvin Muchnick<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/concussioninc.net\/?p=8750\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Search for Fort Lauderdale City Documents Widens Net of Accountability for Abusive USA Swimming Coach Alex Pussieldi - Concussion Inc. - Author Irvin Muchnick\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"by Irvin Muchnick and Tim Joyce &nbsp; 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