With the football programs at Baylor and Boise State in a disagreement over who knew what about Sam Ukwuachu, the former announced it would investigate claims it knew about the defensive end's violent past when accepting his transfer.
Baylor University (BU) released a statement Friday, the day after Ukwuachu was convicted of second-degree sexual assault. The "comprehensive internal inquiry" will try to determine whether or not BU and its football staff were aware of the accusations of domestic violence against the defensive end when he attended Boise State.
Jeremy Counseller, a law professor at BU who serves as a representative to the Big 12 Conference and NCAA, will lead the investigation, The Guardian reported.
BU head football coach Art Briles stated Thursday he spoke to Chris Petersen, Ukwuachu's former coach at Boise State, at the time of the transfer in May 2013 and only believed the student-athlete to be homesick.
Petersen, now coaching the football team at Washington, told ESPN on Thursday that he "initiated a call" with Briles to tell him about "Sam's disciplinary record and dismissal." Though Ukwuachu was dismissed allegedly for domestic violence, he was said to have a volatile attitude overall, and was using drugs.
However, BU claims none of that came to their attention and neither was it documented. Briles released a statement after Petersen spoke publicly and the BU athletic department shared Ukwuachu's transfer documents in the same public release.
"I was contacted by Coach Petersen at Boise State in spring 2013 and he told me he had a player from Texas who needed to get closer to home and that he thought our program would be a good spot for him," Briles said in the release. "I know and respect Coach Petersen and he would never recommend a student-athlete to Baylor that he didn't believe in. In our discussion, he did not disclose that there had been violence toward women, but he did tell me of a rocky relationship with his girlfriend which contribute."
In Oct. 2013, months after transferring to BU, Ukwuachu was accused of raping a female student at the school. He was indicted on two counts of sexual assault and convicted on one. He never played a single down for BU in two seasons and an in-depth report from Texas Monthly suggested that was due to the indictment. During that time, he completed his undergraduate degree at BU and began taking graduate courses.
Ukwuachu was sentenced to six months in jail Friday, as well as 10 years of probation (read more here).
