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

Greg Lee: No penalty too harsh for Bellevue High School

How much more evidence is needed?

There’s no reserving judgment here. What many around the state had long suspected to have been occurring in the Bellevue High football program was revealed to be true in a 68-page report released last week by the WIAA.

I won’t get in to many specifics here but suffice to say that everything from falsifying student athletes’ grades, to falsifying addresses, to recruiting, to excessive payments to coaches, to school district officials turning a blind eye, among various other things, were discovered by two former federal prosecutors commissioned to do the investigation.

It’s time to level a death penalty. High school athletics is first and foremost about the kids. I believe in protecting kids. And, yes, leveling a death penalty would probably be penalizing kids who weren’t part of the salacious mess.

Head coach, Butch Goncharoff, and many of his assistants should be suspended for a couple of years, if not terminated. The Seattle Times reported in a story Wednesday that the Bellevue School Board met late into the night Tuesday talking about suspending the head coach. That’s a good first step.

If I were king for a day, I’d rule Bellevue ineligible for postseason play for every state championship it has won in the last 14 years. That means 11 years.

Harsh smarsh. And I’d take away all the state titles. But even by doing that it’s not too penal. The state titles have already been celebrated. To have a banner and trophy taken away means nothing since those student athletes aren’t at Bellevue anymore.

At some point, penalties will be levied. Bellevue will be given an opportunity to propose a penalty to the KingCo Conference, the league in which it is a member. Then league officials will decide sanctions and pass it along to the WIAA District 2 board for review. If Bellevue disputes the penalties, it would go to the WIAA executive board for appeal.

What galls me is there were a lot of silent victims, including players at Bellevue, the past decade. And what about all the kids who were on teams that were beaten by Bellevue?

The depth of deceitfulness is unparalleled.

The Seattle Times started the ball rolling last fall when it examined the school’s ties to The Academic Institute, an alternative school in Bellevue. According to the Times’ story, former instructors at the school labeled it a “diploma mill”.

Bellevue’s school board is likely to ask for a lenient penalty from the KingCo because it will plead that adults should be sanctioned not kids.

In this case, though, the (play)book should be thrown at the school. A precedent must be set.