Former USC coach testifies
A former assistant women’s soccer coach at USC testified Monday during the first trial in the nationwide college admissions bribery scandal that she regularly created fake athletic profiles with exaggerated accomplishments coupled with images she found on Google to help get unqualified students admitted.
Laura Janke, 39, of North Hollywood, took the stand in U.S. District Court in Boston in the trial of former casino executive Gamal Abdelaziz and former Staples and Gap Inc. executive John Wilson, the Boston Globe reported.
They are among dozens of rich and famous parents charged in the Operation Varsity Blues case, which involved large payments to get undeserving children into elite U.S. universities with rigged test scores or phony athletic accomplishments.
Janke, who worked at USC from 2007 to 2014, testified that she falsified the athletic profile of Abdelaziz’s daughter, making it look like she was a basketball recruit from a Hong Kong school.
Abdelaziz is charged with paying $300,000 to get his daughter into USC as a basketball player even though she couldn’t even make her high school varsity team.
Wilson, who heads a Massachusetts private equity firm, is charged with paying $220,000 to have his son designated as a USC water polo recruit and an additional $1 million to buy his twin daughters’ ways into Harvard and Stanford.
Investigators have several “promising leads” in the shooting death of Utah sophomore cornerback Aaron Lowe, the Salt Lake City police chief said. Lowe was shot at a house party early Sunday . ... Washington State junior wide receiver Brandon Gray was in stable condition in a hospital after being shot early Saturday near campus, coach Nick Rolovich said.
Former Florida women’s basketball coach Cam Newbauer verbally abused players, assistants and staff members, creating a toxic environment that athletic department officials seemingly failed to fix for years, according to a report by the Independent Florida Alligator student-run paper. season with torn left anterior cruciate ligaments. … Carolina decided not to put running back Christian McCaffrey (hamstring) on injured reserve.
The city of Anaheim was ordered in a ruling by Orange County Superior Court Judge David Hoffer to perform a new and more thorough search of public records requested by the citizens group seeking to invalidate the Angel Stadium land sale.
— Bill Shaikin
The Boston Athletic Assn., which administers the Boston Marathon, said it will honor the legacy of the late Ellison “Tarzan” Brown, the race’s champion in 1936 and 1939 and a member of Rhode Island’s Narragansett tribe, in the run-up to the Oct. 11 staging.
Sharpshooting forward Michael Porter Jr. agreed to a five-year maximum extension with the Denver Nuggets that could be worth up to $207 million . ... Sean Walker scored a second-period goal, but the Kings lost 2-1 to the host Arizona Coyotes in an NHL exhibition. Dylan Guenther scored the go-ahead goal for Arizona in the third period . ... UEFA was forced to abandon its attempt to ban Super League clubs Barcelona, Juventus and Real Madrid from the Champions League because of court action over the governing body’s attempt to punish the rebellion . ... Kim Clijsters lost in her latest return to the WTA Tour, dropping a three-setter against Hsieh Su-wei in the first round of the Chicago Fall Tennis Classic.