The story of the N-word volley fired at a black college volleyball player at Brigham Young University last weekend has all the makings of another race-baiting hoax.
BYU hosted a women’s volleyball tournament last weekend, and during one game, a white man fan allegedly and repeatedly called a rival Duke player the N-word.
The godmother of the Duke athlete claimed on social media a white man heckled the player, Rachel Richardson, “every time she served.” The godmother asserted the fan used the N-word repeatedly and also “threatened” Richardson by telling her “to watch her back going to the team bus.”
Richardson agreed with that account. She claimed “my fellow African American teammates and I were targeted and racially heckled throughout the entirety of the match. The slurs and comments grew into threats which caused us to feel unsafe.” She even told ESPN later that BYU “failed to take the necessary steps to stop the unacceptable behavior and create a safe environment.”
The situation was reportedly so heated during the game that a campus police officer was stationed at the Duke bench to prevent potential violence by the offensive fan. At one point, the Salt Lake Tribune added, BYU sent four ushers into the student section to find the culprit.
And they all came up empty.
Eventually, a white man was identified and banned from the game facility on the day following the alleged slurs.
Yet now it appears none of it happened.
The Tribune reported on Tuesday that BYU police watched video of the alleged incidents and concluded they had the wrong guy.
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BYU Police Lt. George Besendorfer told the paper that after cops reviewed surveillance footage of the crowd, the man who was later banned wasn’t shouting anything while Richardson was serving.
“When we watched the video,” he told the Tribune, “we did not observe that behavior from him.”
As the Tribune reported, “An officer later reviewed footage, according to the [police] report, and wrote: ‘There was nothing seen on the game film that led me to believe’ that the man ‘was the person who was making comments to the player who complained about being called the N-word.’”
“During the match’s second set, the officer observed, the [accused man] was not present when Richardson was serving, which is when Richardson’s family and Duke officials said the slurs were yelled. And later, when she was serving again, he was playing on his phone, the officer wrote.”
The cop who was deployed by Duke’s bench noted in his report, “I told the athletic staff that I never heard one racial comment being made.” The Tribune added, “The officer reported he also talked to others there who said they had not heard a slur.”
School officials concluded the same thing.
BYU Associate Athletic Director Jon McBride told the Tribune, “Various BYU Athletics employees have been reviewing video from BYUtv and other cameras in the facility that the volleyball team has access to for film review. This has been ongoing since right after the match on Friday night. The person who was banned was the person identified by Duke as using racial slurs. However, we have been unable to find any evidence of that person using slurs in the match.”
BYU said it is still investigating. And according to the Tribune, BYU Athletic Director Tom Holmoe was begging someone in attendance that night to come forward.
Holmoe said he wanted someone to “have the courage to take a stand and take care of each other and more importantly the guests, our guests who we invited to come and play here.”
Yet no one has.
Citing Lt. Besendorfer, the Tribune reported, “no one from the student section or elsewhere at the volleyball match last week has come forward to BYU police to report the individual responsible for the slur. He also said no one has come forward to say they heard the slur being shouted during the match. He implored students who heard the comments to come forward.”
“We wish someone would,” he told the paper.
It’s doubtful that will happen because it’s likely the incident itself never happened.
The Cougar Chronicle, a student newspaper, cited a source inside the Athletics Department who reached out to its staff. It identified him only as Connor, so that person would not get in trouble.
Connor told the Chronicle, “Her story doesn’t add up, BYU banned an innocent man to appease the mob and make their PR mess go away. While I don’t know if Ms. Richardson genuinely misheard something or intentionally made up this story, it certainly does not constitute the criticism BYU has gotten.”
“There is zero evidence of a slur being said. Not a single witness, besides Ms. Richardson, has come forth. Not a single cell phone video or BYUtv’s several camera angles caught a single thing. How unlikely when this person supposedly said a slur during ‘every single serve.'”
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Free Press.
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