Sean Hutchinson‘s permanent ban from Olympic sports is now finalized, which was confirmed by the US Center for Safe Sport on Monday in an e-mail to Olympian Ariana Kukors Smith and her attorney Bob Allard. Shortly after the email was sent, Hutchison’s ban was posted on the Center’s public website.
Hutchinson, Kukors’s former coach at the now-defunct USA Swimming Center of Excellence at FAST, was handed a permanent ban on October 5th after the Center’s investigation into claims made by Kukors that Hutchinson had groomed and sexually abused her for years.
According to documents on the SafeSport website:
If a violation of the Code is found, the Responding Party shall have five business days from receipt of the Director’s notice to request a hearing concerning the Director’s Decision. The Responding Party may request a hearing concerning the Director’s finding(s) that there was a violation of the Code, the sanction or both. If the Responding Party fails to request a hearing within five business days, the Director’s Decision shall go into effect unless the Director determines that the Responding Party has shown good cause for an extension of the time to request a hearing.
The confirmation that the ban is now final would indicate that Hutchinson did not request an appeal hearing during the 30-day appeals period. You can read more details about the entire SafeSport investigation and sanction process in this article.
In the wake of many high-profile allegation of sexual assault over the past year, Kukors Smith went public in February with allegations that Hutchinson, her long-time coach from the age of 13 through her time as a professional as the Fullerton Area Swim Team, had groomed her beginning at the age of 13 and began sexually abusing her when she was 16. Hutchinson quickly categorically denied the allegations.
It’s been quite the winding road since then. Former US National Team head coach Mark Schubert claimed that he had reported rumors of an inappropriate relationship between Hutchinson and Kurkos. Shortly thereafter, Susan Woessner, former director of SafeSport for USA Swimming, resigned after admitting that she had failed to mention a conflict of interest when she had been part of USA Swimming’s investigation into Hutchinson in 2010 that she and Hutchison had been intimate.
In May, Kukors Smith filed a lawsuit against Hutchinson, Schubert, and USA Swimming, seeking to “hold people accountable.” A spokesperson for Allard confirms that the civil side of the accusations is still ongoing. Schubert responded to the suit by denying any wrongdoing.
In August, the Arizona Republic published inappropriate text messages from Hutchinson and longtime coach Bob Bowman to another USA Swimming Olympian, Caroline Burckle.
Maybe it’s just me, but it seems to be in poor taste for swimswam to sell adspace on their website to Ashley Madison. The fact that the ad is posted on the same page as story about a coach who is now banned seems to be in direct contradiction to the whole “Safesport” campaign that USA Swimming is promoting. You’ve got legions of high school student-athletes (and younger) checking this website daily for the latest in swim news, and with it they get an ad for a service that promotes “life is short, have an affair!” Keep it to swimming, swimswam.
The adds that you see on most websites are based on cookies picked up from other websites you visit. I personally am seeing a bunch of ads from best buy. Not sure why you are seeing Ashley Madison adds but the algorithms for the adds obviously think you want to see them.
Is this really a thing on this site? Yesterday I saw an ad on here for male Brazilian thongs. I was like wtf swimswam? But you are saying this is my fault? Swimswam are you selling ads for the thongs or am I the sicko?
Google and other companies provide the ads you’re referencing, we don’t sell them directly. There are supposed to be blocks on ‘sensitive’ categories, but it’s apparent that the blocks have failed somewhere. Yes, they are generally based on the sites your computer has visited, but the connections made can be complicated (the ad providers can translate ‘competitive swimwear’ as ‘Brazilian thong swimsuits.’
We’ll work on getting these things blocked.
Then explain why I see ads for Sailor Moon body pillows when I’m more of a Sailor Jupiter guy?
This is too good.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! You really exposed yourself on that one! OMG. Best comment ever!
I get Walgreen’s and amazon ads.
Either you are accessing that kind if site yourself or someone in your family is. Google ads uses your data to place ads on websites. Lol.
Erik has coached at both Tualatin Hills (Paul Bergen) and SNOWW (Michael Pliuskaitis) so I guess that makes him a SafeSport expert now.
Just not an expert on ‘the internet’ and how ‘internet’ ads work.
All, we’re aware of the problem and are working on it. Please try to keep the thread on task as best you can.
It really do be like that
How’s SNOW doing Erik?
Has there been any sanctions against Bowman yet?
There never will be because guess who’s coach he was…
There won’t be because, like it or not, there were no SafeSport violations. She was an adult and was retired / no longer competing as a USA Swimming athlete when this happened. Questionable judgment and behavior by Bowman? Yes, which he admitted to. But as far as the law and the SafeSport reviews go, he didn’t do anything illegal or in violation of.
Only the label “Creeper for Life”
A move in the right direction.
It would be nice if those with knowledge of Coach Alexandre Pussieldi’s predatory behavior and sexual assault history spoke up as well, instead of covering it up. And if CBDA in Brazil enacted a similar ban, prohibiting Pussieldi from coaching, but also from participating in national and international meets, where he does commentating for the SporTV network.
Agreed – the Pussieldi situation is ridiculous…