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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Police investigate UW player

Men’s basketball athlete accused of sexual assault

Percy Allen Seattle Times

Washington men’s basketball coach Lorenzo Romar acknowledged the Seattle Police are conducting a sexual-assault investigation involving one of his players and a 16-year-old girl.

Romar fielded questions Tuesday about the investigation, but declined to provide specifics. He did not identify the player. The Seattle Times does not generally identify suspects who have not been charged. No arrests have been made and no charges filed in the case.

Romar said UW is taking the situation seriously but that there is not enough information available yet to take any action. Romar said every player will travel to the Bay Area for Thursday’s game at Stanford and Sunday’s game at California and that every player will practice with the team. He said there’s no change in the starting lineup, which will be Aziz N’Diaye, Matthew Bryan-Amaning, Justin Holiday, Isaiah Thomas and Venoy Overton.

Romar began his weekly news conference by addressing the investigation.

“We’ve been informed there is an investigation about an allegation (in) regards to one of our student-athletes,” Romar said. “And I want you to know it’s something that we take very seriously at this point. I’m going to repeat that, it’s very serious. However, there is not nearly enough information at this point for us to determine what’s going to be done here. Right now we just have to give it a little bit more time to decide what’s going to come of this.

“Beyond that I’m not going to say much more about it. I know that you’d like to know some things, but I just can’t.”

According to a police report filed Sunday, a 16-year-old girl and her friends met the player and a group of his friends at a Central District apartment belonging to the player’s sister. There, according to the report, the girl said the player forced her to perform a sex act on him before she left and called her uncle. The girl said the assault continued even after she told the player, “No.”

There was no answer at the apartment Tuesday morning. Two neighbors, who declined to identify themselves, said they knew nothing about the alleged incident.

The report says the girl was taken to Harborview Medical Center.

On Tuesday, three women who appeared at the door of the player’s listed address in Seattle first said they did not know him, but repeatedly told a reporter that the allegations were untrue and that the “story was changing.” They declined to identify themselves.

Romar would not answer a question about whether UW was conducting its own investigation. He was asked about the investigation being a distraction to his team.

“Again it’s something that is ongoing and hopefully, you’ve talked with your team, you have a relationship with your team enough when something happens, you’re prepared somewhat to deal with it,” Romar said. “You haven’t covered everything. There’s some situations that arise in sports and family situations that just haven’t happened to you before.

“It’s the first time and you have to deal with that. There’s some situations there’s not necessarily a manual for it. I think we have a together group and whatever happens with our group, we usually deal with it together.”

Before the news conference, Romar said he had not met with his players as a team.