The former head coach of Ohio State University has admitted he knew the team doctor was sexually abusing his wrestlers which contradicts his recent statements of support for Rep. Jim Jordan who was coaching with him at he time.
CNN reports, "A former Ohio State University wrestling coach says he warned a team doctor -- whose alleged actions are the subject of a school investigation into sexual abuse allegations -- that the doctor was "too hands on" with student athletes, according to a video produced last month by aformer student wrestler who says he was abused."
A few days ago, Rep. Jordan retained a high profile conservative PR firm to stump for his innocence. They released a statement featuring Coach Hellickson's statements.
In a phone interview on Monday, former Ohio State University head wrestling coach Russ Hellickson vehemently denied that he or Jordan had ever seen or been told that Dr. Richard Strauss was molesting or sexually assaulting OSU wrestlers during the 1980s and '90s.
That didn't hold up very long.
On the tape, Hellickson said that many of the wrestlers were “uncomfortable” with Dr. Strauss’s behavior and that he had confronted Strauss about it. There was Strauss’s lingering in the showers with wrestlers and fondling them during weigh-ins.
When Strauss told Hellickson that he showered with the wrestlers as well, Hellickson told him: “Yeah. Not for an hour, doc.”Hellickson also told Strauss he was “much too hands on” with the wrestlers. In response, Strauss told him he was just being “thorough.” (In a discussion of the tape Wednesday morning on CNN, a CNN journalist who has watched the tape said the being “hands on” was during weigh-ins.) Critically, Hellickson said he’d communicated his concerns about the shower situation to University administrators. “Certainly, all of my administrators recognized that it was an issue for me I’m sure that I talked to all of them on numerous occasions about my discontent with the environment.”
This destroys Jordan's credibility and his argument that he and all the other coaches knew nothing about the serial abusing team doctor in their midst at Ohio State University.
Of this, we can be certain now.