Commentary: Wake's Woods runs legal fast break
By Ed Hardin
Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
updated Wednesday, October 6, 8:56 am
WINSTON-SALEM — October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and here’s a case you might not be aware of.
Tony Woods, a basketball player at Wake Forest, was arrested in September and charged with an assault inflicting serious injury, assault on a female and assault inflicting serious injury with a minor present.
The victim, his girlfriend and a student at Wake Forest, suffered a fractured spine.
Now here’s why you might not be aware of all this: The case has already been resolved.
In what is either an example of efficiency in the judicial system or of an athlete getting preferential treatment, Woods pleaded guilty to assault on a female, and the other two charges were dropped. He received a 60-day suspended sentence and a $100 fine and will have to perform 100 hours of community service, undergo anger management and be screened for drug and alcohol abuse.
Did the sentence fit the crime here? No, says Susan Wies, director of the Victim Services Division at Family Service of the Piedmont, a nonprofit support agency in Greensboro.
“That one concerns me,” she says. “He needs help, and anger management is not what he needs.”
On the surface, this seemed like an easy call. North Carolina guidelines are clear. Woods should’ve been jailed for 48 hours, and the case should’ve been tried to the fullest extent of the system. But that didn’t happen. His attorney, Wake alumnus Mike Grace, called Judge Denise Hartsfield, an adjunct professor at the Wake Forest School of Law and alumna, who made a personal visit to the Forsyth County jail and arranged for Woods to walk away without going behind bars.
Four weeks later, Woods stood before Judge William Reingold, an adjunct professor at the Wake Forest School of Law and an alumnus, and received his sentence. Wake assistant basketball coach Walt Corbean was in court with Woods. The judge told Corbean that Woods would benefit from the structure of the basketball team.
And just like that, it was over.
The victim, 20-year-old Courtney Barbour, has left school and gone home. Woods is awaiting a decision by the basketball program to see if he’s still on the roster. Jeff [Redacted], the new men’s basketball coach, suspended Woods indefinitely when the charges were filed.
“We are suspending Tony Woods indefinitely in order to allow him to devote his time and effort to address the allegations that he is facing,” [Redacted] said in a statement more than a week after police said Woods kicked and pushed Barbour, fracturing her spine while their 8-month-old child was present. “It is also important that Tony have the necessary time to maintain his good academic standing.”
There’s apparently a lot more to this story than we’ve been told. Jim O’Neill, the district attorney in Forsyth County, said his office had spoken with the victim and her family numerous times, and he said the family was more than happy with the sentence.
“We had about a dozen conversations with them,” O’Neill said. “I’m not at liberty to divulge what was discussed, but the family was satisfied with the outcome, and at the end of the day that’s what matters most.”
Barbour couldn’t be reached Tuesday. A spokesman in the Wake Forest University’s registrar’s office said she is no longer enrolled.
On Tuesday, a spokesman from the Wake Forest sports information office said Woods’ status with the team is being evaluated, and a decision will be made in the coming days by [Redacted], athletics director Ron Wellman and Wake Forest president Nathan O. Hatch.
Courtney Barbour was at Wake Forest on an academic scholarship. Her status is she has a fractured spine after an encounter with a 6-foot-11, 250-pound man who will now undergo anger management.
“He’s an abuser,” Wies said. “Nothing about this sounds correct to me.”
Woods was tried and sentenced, quickly, in a legal system filled with Deacons and now we await his status for basketball.
Wies is right. Nothing about this sounds correct.
