Written by Joe Christensen at Detroit Free Press.com
Ten Minnesota football players have been suspended indefinitely from all team activities, the university announced Tuesday.
The suspended players are Ray Buford (Southfield), Carlton Djam, Seth Green, KiAnte Hardin, Dior Johnson (Southfield), Tamarion Johnson (Detroit Bradford), Kobe McCrary, Antonio Shenault, Mark Williams and Antoine Winfield Jr.
The university statement says: “Due to privacy restrictions relating to student educational data, there is nothing further the University can share.”
Lee Hutton, an attorney representing several of the players, said the suspensions stem from an internal university investigation into the same alleged Sept. 2 incident in a Dinkytown apartment that led the Gophers to suspend four of the players while Minneapolis police investigated.
Those four players — Buford, Hardin, Dior Johnson and Tamarion Johnson — missed three games while police investigated, and they were reinstated when Hennepin County declined to press charges. No arrests were made in the alleged incident.
An alleged victim from the Sept. 2 incident, who is part of the Gophers game-day operations, filed restraining orders against those four players, along with Djam, that kept the five players out of TCF Bank Stadium.
The restraining orders were dismissed in a settlement Nov. 2.
But the university’s office of Equal Opportunity and Affirmative Action conducted its own investigation, which led to these latest suspensions.
Buford’s father, Ray Buford Sr., is security director for Detroit Mayor Mike Duggan. “It’s just been a total shock,” he said. “It’s almost like I’m in the movies or the Twilight Zone.
“Ray’s a strong kid, but obviously, you’re frustrated. You feel like you’ve put this behind you.
“The police have cleared you and found that you were telling the truth. The prosecutor’s office has cleared you and found you were telling the truth. And the judge has cleared you, and this group (the EOAA) comes in and says they were all wrong. It’s beyond me. It just reeks to the high heavens.”
Buford Sr. confirmed the accuracy of a letter obtained by KSTP-TV that was sent to his son that said the EOAA had found him responsible for several violations of the university’s Student Conduct Code, including harm to a person, sexual misconduct, violation of university rules relating to sexual harassment and persistent violations of the code. The letter offered him the choice of accepting expulsion “to resolve this matter informally.”
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