LOS ANGELES _ A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge granted Todd McNair's motion for a new trial in the former USC assistant coach's long-running defamation lawsuit against the NCAA and issued a stinging rebuke of how the organization investigated the Reggie Bush extra benefits scandal.
In a ruling filed Wednesday morning, Judge Frederick Shaller wrote that there wasn't sufficient evidence to support a jury's finding in May that the NCAA didn't defame McNair. The judge also ruled that the jury foreman, an attorney whose firm did appellate work for the NCAA in the case years earlier, should have been disqualified.
"Permitting Juror No. 2 to remain on the jury and participate in deliberations and the verdict resulted in a miscarriage of justice and in Plaintiff being deprived of a fair trial," Shaller wrote. "Without Juror No. 2 it is likely a different outcome would have resulted."
The NCAA's Committee on Infractions found in June 2010 that McNair engaged in unethical conduct in connection with Bush, an All-American running back, receiving extra benefits from sports marketers while playing at USC. The committee punished McNair with a one-year "show-cause" penalty and USC declined to renew his contract. McNair sued the NCAA a year later, arguing the stigma from the punishment made coaching with another college or professional team all but impossible.
Shaller wrote that the infractions committee's report was false "in several material ways," particularly in stating that Lloyd Lake, one of the sports marketers, told NCAA investigators he called McNair in January 2006 to get the coach to compel Bush to follow through on an agreement with Lake.
The NCAA cited this call as the "linchpin" of its case against McNair.
Shaller noted, however, that Lake didn't tell investigators who initiated the call or that the parties discussed the agreement.
Shaller savaged the "sloppy" and "botched" interview of Lake by NCAA investigators, calling them "unprofessional" and "clearly not prepared" and "mistaken as to basic facts."
"The answers made by Lake to interview questions were unclear and unresponsive to the point of being unreliable and lacking in any value," Shaller wrote. "When the report was written, the actual and critical content of the questions and answers was changed and/or recharacterized. Also, improperly non-responsive and speculative responses by Lake were recorded as being true."
McNair's attorneys declined to comment on the judge's decision. The NCAA didn't immediately respond to a request for comment.
The NCAA is all but certain to appeal, meaning the case will be tied up in the 2nd District Court of Appeal, which issued rulings favorable to McNair earlier in the case, for a year or more.
McNair, who coached the offensive line at Village Christian last year, accepted a job as running backs coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers last week. He hasn't coached at the college or professional level since USC declined to renew his contract.
