I’m picking up what you’re dropping, but at this point there are multiple “hot” threads on facebook, with 800+ comments each. I certainly won’t be reading all of it, but several on this thread are alluding that top trainers/riders/some stewards are spitting venom. If we could condense that with their names, that would be easier than trying to filter 20k of comments, even in an excel sheet. 
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Yes it is. And it’s disgusting.
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You don’t have to read the comments to take screen shots.
Safesport is run by retired and well-versed law enforcement officials. Unfortunately the American judicial system cannot do anything if victims fail to fully cooperate and are prepared to stand in a courtroom and testify. As we have seen with the attacks on victims in this thread and others; one can understand why victims don’t want to talk.
That is where Safesport comes in. Safesport is not a replacement of the American judicial system. It cannot put people in jail or criminally charge them with anything. It protects the integrity of the sport for minors and protects the club/organization for the sport.
The sport is essentially a “club” or an organization. If a person is reported for misconduct, they are investigated by Safesport (an entity outside of USEF’s control!). If they are found to have been in misconduct with a minor, they are given sanctions and kicked out of the club. This is not a criminal investigation carried out by law enforcement but it is done by those who are very well trained in their fields.
It’s pretty cut and dry to me. If you want to engage in such inappropriate behavior, you will be kicked out of the club. And what affect that has on your business is entirely up to you and the actions you have chosen to take in life. Safesport is not setting down or investigating people just for the fun of it. They are not kicking people out of the club because a 16 and 18 year old dated. There are plenty of people who have been investigated and dismissed by Safesport.
If the evidence is there or the confessions are there; individuals will be dismissed from the organization. For all we know, Gage could’ve confessed his actions to individuals within Safesport. Safesport’s investigation isn’t just taking the victims side of the story and running with it.
It just absolutely blows my mind that in a sport, that for decades (!) has been known for sexual misconduct with minors, people are not supporting Safesport and letting the investigations take their due-course. I see mothers on my social media page who have little girls that ride and are under the age of 15 who are ripping Safesport apart because of Gage’s suicide. This is painful to me. Safesport DID ITS JOB through the investigation process. If Gage felt he was wrongly accused, he was able to Appeal if he so wished.
I personally feel that blaming Safesport for Gage’s death is incorrect and an accusation made out of carelessness. Suicide is very sad. No one wants to see anyone take their own life. It causes a lot of anger from those closest to the individual who loved and cared for them. My heart goes out to those closest to Gage who had a positive relationship with him. But that doesn’t dismiss what happened to those individuals 30+ years ago who have had to live with that pain all of this time.
And for those saying that because this happened 30-40 years ago and individuals shouldn’t be investigated because of that length of time/it was a different era back then… SHAME ON YOU. Sure, Gage probably changed a lot in the last 30-40 years and became a very nice and trusting individual; I dont deny that. 30-40 years ago it was still very much wrong to grope young minor girls, groom them to be your sex partner, corner them in the stall and feel them up, etc. Yes, perhaps most of society turned a blind eye to it but that didn’t make it “right”. If the victims are saying it wasn’t consensual and the accused has answered questions in an investigation honestly that lined up with what the accusations where; it’s pretty cut and dry
But to blame Safesport for what happened to Gage is ridiculous. How about some accountability to the individuals who have done this to young girls, regardless of where and when. that is where the blame lies. Safesport didn’t ruin Gage’s career. Safesport didn’t drive him to end his life. Personally, I think there was a lot of guilt on behalf of Gage and despite being able to appeal, he couldn’t live with this finally being brought to the public’s eye.
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Am I to understand Kathy Brown Serio’s husband went thru a wrongful accusation by SS and the lengthy post was a description of the process they went thru?
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Someone accused her husband and the rant outlines that the process works. Safe Sport looked into the accusation and dismissed it.
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So Safesport works EXACTLY how it’s supposed to but she sounds so bitter she’s out to shame and say EVERYONE is lying and out to lay false blame…I’m sorry, but honestly she sounds exactly like a person I never want to meet! Victim blaming and calling for troops to effectively “witch hunt” is honestly, disgusting!
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Exactly. It’s why I struggle to feel bad. The public posts about their friend’s passing on these people’s pages were written to get everyone riled up.
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I am going to go out on a limb here and suggest that 1.) having sex with your underage students or clients is WRONG, regardless of the time period or culture 2.) people knew that it was wrong back in the 70s and 80s. That they did it anyway because it was common, not reported and everyone turned a blind eye doesn’t make it right and doesn’t mean that the perpetrators didn’t know it was wrong at the time.
Louder for the people in back: Sex with your minor students was and is WRONG. No matter how they were dressed or how flirty they were. Using your position of authority or power to influence or coerce your minor students into having sex with you was and is, REALLY, REALLY WRONG.
People seem to be a little vague or wish-washy about these concepts, so I thought it needed to be said.
I am very sorry Rob Gage took his own life, and I have lots of sympathy for the people who knew and loved him who are trying to reconcile the man they knew with these allegations. That’s a lot of pain to process. I wish them healing and peace.
But blaming the survivors, blaming SafeSport, blaming Anne Kursinski and saying she has blood on her hands(!), blaming anyone BUT the abusers needs to stop. And I hope the people who are making impassioned public statements to that effect are going to be very embarrassed and ashamed when the dust finally clears.
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To me, the depth of outrage over SafeSport serves as proof of how serious the problem is in the sport. It illustrates just how widespread and acceptable the sexual abuse of young women and girls is in this sport and how dysfunctional relationships between trainers, students, and parents have somehow become considered to be normal.
It’s kind of disheartening.
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Mourning is one thing. Allowing that much hate and open hostility toward others go on and on for days is another. There are many options available to her if mourning is her only purpose. She could make her page private. She could delete the worst posts. She could step in and ask people to remain civil and remind them that there are victims out there. She could stop the open “murderers!” comments. She could remind people to CYA by curtailing incriminating comments.
Instead it appears from the outside that she’s encouraging the negative discussion through complacency. At minimum she is allowing that trash fire of a ‘discussion’ to carry on unchecked.
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I hope that anyone who has engaged in such a practice in the past, no matter how long ago it was or how fleeting, winds up looking over their shoulder in fear for the rest of their life. And I also hope that this will serve as a very real lesson to those who are even slightly contemplating doing something like this.
P.S. RIP Eros. I loved watching you compete. Looks like you enjoyed your retirement.
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If during the investigation of an accusation, SafeSport investigators have reason to believe that the accuser intentionally logged a false accusation would they initiate their own investigation and sanction the accuser? Or would the accused need to file their own accusation against the false accuser for an investigation to be started?
Think about the Kathy Serio case and whether it’s a case of her husband being falsely accused and if yes was the accuser sanctioned. Or was it more a case of the accuser made a legitimate and in good-faith accusation that SafeSport investigated and deemed to NOT be a violation of the code of conduct.
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I’m not sure how that relates to the RG issue. There was enough serious evidence with multiple victims to ban him as quoted pages back on this thread from a USA Today article. (Not 100% sure I gave the right name of the newspaper). He had the right to appeal and was in the process of appealing. This is not the case of one accuser providing false evidence.
Maybe I misunderstand your point but it looks like you are implying that this is a case of one false accusation and you would like to know if that person will be sanctioned. That isn’t even relevant to this thread.
There are threads about Safesport here and Kathy Serio has her own post on FB.
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@oneequestrienne Sorry my point/questions weren’t directed at the RG case. Others posted about Kathy Serio’s husband and that he was temporarily suspended but that suspension was ultimately lifted and that that was an indication that the SafeSport process works. Many of those voicing concerns or negativity about SafeSport in light of the RG case seem focused on the potential for a false accusation to ruin someone’s career. So I was just trying to understand if SafeSport would automatically investigate and sanction an accuser who has made a knowingly false accusation.
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^ I’ve been wondering about follow up concerning cases where Safe Sport investigations do not find evidence to hand out sanctions as well. The standard is apparently “a preponderance of the evidence.” They do not seem tasked with clearing anyone’s name (it’s not what our justice system does either). But not even meeting the preponderance of the evidence standard is specific.
I am most certainly NOT an apologist for anyone who has ever engaged in the sort of conduct SafeSport was developed to eradicate from sports. And I understand full well the difference between an administrative process, and a criminal process. A ban from a private organization is quite a different thing than a conviction, being a lifelong registered sex offender, and possibly serving any jail time for a sex offense.
With that said, I would like to better understand the reason that people’s names are published on the Safe Sport website as being on an “interim suspension” while the investigation is ongoing. Why not inform an individual that they are on an interim suspension, but wait to list their name on the Safe Sport website until the investigation is completed?
Granted, the RG matter has already been through the investigative process, and a permanent ban was the decision. He had the right to an appeal, but I can see on the list of names that they note the people who still have the possibility of making an appeal…
Additionally… perhaps Safe Sport or USEF should consider issuing a statistical report sometime soon that provides numbers related to …
- Number of total complaints received so far
- Number of complaints that were dismissed outright after the initial preliminary investigation
- Number of complaints that were forwarded to the Safe Sport Center for in-depth investigation after initial preliminary phase.
- Number of complaints that were dismissed after the in-depth investigation by the Safe Sport Center.
I find numbers like this sometimes provide a much more clear picture of what is going on… right now, I can only see the names and number of people on the list who are either temporarily banned pending the outcome of their investigation, or permanently banned.
I do understand how anyone who had their name appear on the “temporarily banned pending investigation outcome” list for months on end for the public at large to see, might be frustrated at the end of the process if their name was simply taken off the list, and no further information went out to the public. Where does someone go to get their reputation back? Maybe an interim list that people’s names shift too… which notes that John Smith was investigated, but no administrative action was recommended by the SafeSport Center, and the temporary ban has been lifted is a possibility. Then their name could stay their for 6 to 12 months. And the public could draw their own conclusions. Nothing needs to be said about victims or the charges… but the obvious inference people could make is that the claim, whatever it was, was not substantiated even by the “preponderance of the evidence” standard.
Please don’t mistake this comment as any sort of an attack on Safe Sport. I think Safe Sport is necessary. Wish it wasn’t. But it obviously is. But I also think there seems to be some room for a bit more in the way of transparency and improvement.
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Just edited my post - wanted to clarify that I am not in any way following up on the idea that any sanctions should be levied against accusers.
I do think it might be fair if there was some way to note when accusations are not substantiated at all.
From what I can see from the sidelines… there is quite a bit of evidence to justify the bans that have been handed down so far.
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I wonder if someone falsely accused could sue in civil court.
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Threads often wander here and there a bit as they get longer. It’s a public forum with no rule that says side issues are not allowed.
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Some interesting statistics re SafeSport cases. They have a database, but I wasn’t able to get anything to come up…Poor tech skills or a problem with their system?
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/25/sports/olympics-sexual-misconduct-safesport.html Note that this was from Sept last year.
