According to Longwood Athletics, men’s basketball player Victor Dorsey has been suspended from the first three games of the 2014-2015 season.
These games include a scrimmage against Division three opponent Hampden-Sydney College, a regular season matchup with Division three Averett and a game on Nov. 18 against in-state JMU.
Associate Vice President for Athletics Communications, Chris Cook, told The Rotunda that the suspension was made alongside disciplinary action taken by the University, though the action is not public.
Representatives of the university and the Athletics Department would not confirm whether this team-induced suspension is connected to an act of vandalism involving the same player this summer, which resulted in nearly $10,000 of damages to campus property.
For the past month, The Rotunda staff has been investigating an incident involving freshman Victor Dorsey and former Longwood men’s basketball player Charlie Lockwood.
According to Longwood University’s Chief of Police, Robert Beach, in the early morning of June 28, a university golf cart was stolen and later crashed into the breezeway between Greenwood Library and Java City where Race Street and Brock Commons connect. The incident is listed on the university’s official crime log as vandalism with a ‘Pending’ case status at the time of publication.
Dorsey is a six-foot-nine, 200-pound freshman forward from Akron, Ohio, according to the official men’s basketball roster.
Lockwood, a six-foot- ten, 210-pound center from Englewood, California, was a member of head Coach Jayson Gee’s first recruiting class and was redshirted as a freshman. This means he did not play during the 2013-2014 basketball season.
Longwood University’s Director of Communications and Media Relations, Matthew McWilliams, reported $6,923 of damage to the Race Street side of the breezeway, and $800 to the Brock Commons side. Repairs to the golf cart were $1,300, and adding in labor costs, damage totaled slightly less than $10,000.
Ben Myers, Longwood’s director of facilities operations services, said from what he saw of the damages, the driver likely attempted to time the opening of the sliding doors in the breezeway to drive in one side and out the other.
The Rotunda’s attempts to receive the initial incident report from the Longwood Police Department were denied. However, McWilliams provided a copy of the report after all interviews for this story were conducted.
According to the incident report, officer Quincy Steele responded and discovered broken glass next to the breezeway. It states: “It is believed that this incident is related to Mr. Charles Lockwood and a second unknown subject that ran from Sgt. [John] Johnson and Officer [Billy] Shular earlier in the night after they had taken one of the golf cars and crashed it into the construction fence at the corner of Redford St. West and Griffin Blvd near Cox dorm.”
Beach confirmed Dorsey as the second student-athlete involved and described Longwood’s police investigation, “We caught one of them. That person confessed who the other person was and we held him accountable according to the judicial process.”
Lockwood is no longer a member of the basketball team, or enrolled at the university. When contacted to comment on the summer incident, Longwood’s Athletics Department would not confirm Dorsey’s involvement, but stated that he was facing internal disciplinary action.
Cook clarified, “Victor’s team- induced suspension is due to a violation of team rules. We are not divulging what that specific violation was, just that there was a specific violation and that he will be disciplined appropriately.”
Dorsey’s team-induced suspension will impact a “handful of games,” according to Cook.
The golf cart crash occurred 17 weeks before the Athletics Department confirmed Dorsey’s team-induced penalty to The Rotunda.
Neither Dorsey, nor Lockwood, were criminally charged in the theft of the golf cart or the damages to Greenwood Library.
Beach stated that the Longwood Police Department has a specific principle to guide them when a person has broken a university rule or law. Beach said if they are “respectful, honest and are not a danger to themselves or others,” the police department seeks the “least-damaging way to hold the person accountable.”
Beach added that both players were cooperative with the Longwood police throughout their investigation.
McWilliams stated that in cases such as vandalism leading to direct damage to campus property, the university responds by repairing the damage and attempting to “recoup the funds from those involved.”
However, when asked whether the student-athletes involved in the June 28 crash were required to defray costs for repairs, McWilliams said, “Whether that happened or not is not publicly available. I don’t know that anyone could tell you that.”
The Rotunda requested the facilities work order to assess damages to the library. No documentation was provided by the time of publication.
According to the dean of the Greenwood Library, Suzy Palmer, the Race Street entrance to the library was blocked off for repairs for “several weeks,” but the money for repairs did not impact the library’s budget.
At the time of the incident, Palmer was out of town and first heard of the damages from the library’s head of Collections and Information Services, Tammy Hines.
“The university handling everything is entirely appropriate,” Palmer said. “I didn’t feel as though it was necessary for me to know the details.”
Director of Student Conduct and Integrity, Jen Fraley, said her office is contacted for every Longwood police investigation involving students, even if the police department chooses not to pursue criminal charges.
Calling attention to the Federal Education Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) and the protection it provides to student records, Fraley said her office cannot confirm that a case was heard by the Conduct Board regarding the June 28 theft and crash.
“If it is something that happens here over the summer, we can go ahead and hear that case over the summer. If it is a summer student that was taking classes, we can adjudicate that over the summer,” Fraley commented.
Longwood’s registrar office confirmed that Dorsey was an enrolled student this past summer. The incident happened during the Summer II session, which began June 16 and ended on July 10.
Speaking on behalf of the university, McWilliams stated, “The university in this incident actedappropriately,astheydoin all incidences of student conduct. We investigated the incident and touched off the investigation with the code of conduct and took appropriate steps. The proceedings of course can’t be disclosed, but we feel like we did everything appropriately.”
The men’s basketball team’s season begins with an exhibition against Hampden-Sydney on Saturday, Nov. 8 at 5 p.m. at Willett Hall.
The Rotunda requested to speak with second-year head men’s basketball Coach Jayson Gee for this story, but he was not made available to comment.
