Kansas and North Carolina State Named In New FBI Charges Related to NCAA Corruption Investigation
Kansas and North Carolina State were named in new federal charges filed in the FBI's investigation into corruption in college basketball Tuesday.
Both schools were accused of being connected to former Adidas global sports marketing director for basketball, James "Jim" Gatto.
The allegations related to NC State concern a player who was a top recruit in North Carolina, and played at NC State during the 2016-17 season before leaving for the NBA. Starting around 2015, Gatto allegedly conspired to pay $40,000 to the father of the player—listed as "Parent-1" in the documents—in order to assure the player attended NC State and signed a sponsorship with Adidas when he decided to go to the NBA. It is alleged that after the player committed to NC State, he began to second guess the decision and considered de-committing, but Gatto made a $40,000 payment to an NC State coach—listed as "Coach-4" in the documents—who then delivered it to Parent-1.
The allegations concerning Kansas are in relation to two players. The first allegation listed concerns a player who signed his letter to play for Kansas on Nov. 9, 2016. Gatto allegedly conspired to pay $90,000 to the player's mother—listed as "Parent-3" in the documents—to get the player to attend Kansas and sign with Adidas when he left for the NBA. Gatto allegedly made payments to an AAU team controlled by a person listed in the documents as "Co-Conspirator-3" who then gave multiple payments to Parent-3 from October 2016 through May 2017.
The second player mentioned in the allegations against Kansas committed to the school on Aug. 30, 2017. The player was allegedly choosing between Kansas and a school sponsored by a rival athletic apparel company, but despite wanting to go to Kansas, he had allegedly already accepted a payment from the other school. Gatto and Co-Conspirator-3 allegedly conspired to pay the player's guardian—listed as "Guardian-1" in the documents—in exchange for the player attending Kansas and signing with Adidas upon going to the NBA. On Sept. 11, 2017, Gatto and Co-Conspirator-3 allegedly discussed paying "another $20,000" to Guardian-1 to get out of the previous deal with the school sponsored by the rival athletic company.
In addition to Kansas and NC State, Louisville and Miami are also mentioned in the new charges, but in relation to previous charges that had already been reported concerning the involvement of those schools in the corruption investigation.
You can look back on the previous charges and implications here.
