Zusskin turned back to O'Toole. "It's my understanding that after a final meeting, you essentially just sort of turned the recruits over to your players and you had no way of knowing what happened after that, am I correct?"
"Well, yes. I trusted my players to follow my rules."
"Which included handing the responsibility of watching out for these teenagers to young men not much older than they were?"
"Yes."
"Mr. O'Toole, we've heard a lot about how easy it is to use your office. Would you say there's a lot of privacy in the office?"
"No, not really," O'Toole replied. "There's often quite a bit of activity."
"So it might be difficult for someone to use your office and privately place a call to an escort service, pay for it with a credit card taken from a drawer in your desk, and then call in an order of booze and also pay for that?"
O'Toole shook his head. "Well, not really. They'd just have to pick a time when no one was around. Like during practice there are usually not many other people there."
"I see," Zusskin replied in a manner meant to imply that he did not see at all and neither should the jury.
Zusskin ended his cross-examination by showing O'Toole the contract he'd signed with the university. "Does this contract state that you agree to abide by the rules, regulations, and decisions of the American Collegiate Athletic Association?"
"Yes."
"And would that include the decision reached by the ACAA hearing panel following its procedures?"
"I guess."
"You guess? Is there another possible answer?"
"No. I meant that I guess that would include the decision reached by the ACAA panel."
"Was this a valid contract when you were asked to appear before the ACAA panel?"
"Yes."
"One last question, Mr. O'Toole. I just want to make sure we're clear about this. You were given the opportunity to make a statement in your defense at the ACAA hearing?"
O'Toole nodded. "Yes, but-"
"I didn't ask for an explanation," Zusskin interrupted. "The universe is full of justifications. Just a simple yes or no."
"Yes."
When Zusskin sat down, Karp and Meyers conferred for a moment before the young attorney rose for redirect.
"Coach O'Toole," Meyers said, emphasizing O'Toole's title, which he'd noticed Zusskin had purposefully avoided, "did you think that signing that contract superseded your constitutional rights as an American citizen?"
"No, I did not," O'Toole replied.
"And I think you were about to add to your answer to Mr. Zusskin's question about whether you were allowed to give a statement to the hearing panel."
"Yes."
"Would you elaborate now, please."
"I was allowed to give a brief statement, essentially denying these accusations. But I wasn't-or you weren't, as my attorney-allowed to cross-examine Rufus Porter, or the ACAA investigator, Jim Larkin, or anyone who spoke against me and we weren't permitted to call any witnesses on my behalf, in my defense."
"One last question. Coach O'Toole, is it accurate to say that you were prepared to abide by the rules, as Mr. Zusskin asked you, as long as they were administered in a fair, impartial, and honest fashion?"
"Yes, that would be accurate."
"Thank you, Coach O'Toole, that's it from me," Meyers said, and looked at Zusskin, who didn't bother to look up from his notes when he replied, "No further questions."
The opening statements and O'Toole's testimony had taken the trial up to the noon hour, when Judge Allen called for a lunch break. When court resumed, Karp called the baseball players Clancy Len and Tashaun Willis as character witnesses, although technically the purpose was to ask them if they had any knowledge of Coach O'Toole sponsoring or paying for parties "at which alcohol is served to underage players and strippers are present."
Both young men had replied in the negative. Even at team parties at the coach's house, players were allowed to drink beer only if they were twenty-one or older "and we have to give him our car keys." Although not said in so many words, the love and the respect both young men had for their coach was unmistakable.
Of more importance, however, Karp thought was the testimony of two athletic directors from other colleges and universities who, as O'Toole had indicated, testified under Meyers's questioning that they would have loved to hire him.
"In fact, we were preparing an offer after baseball season last spring to try to lure Coach O'Toole from the University of Northwest Idaho to come coach for us," said David Huff, the athletic director of a Division I university known for its baseball teams. "When all of this came out, I was prepared to go to bat for him with my administration and the Board of Regents. I hoped we might even go to the ACAA and get the suspension lifted, maybe with probation. But the administration felt it would be a public relations disaster, and I wasn't allowed to offer him the job."
"Did you end up hiring another coach for the position?" Karp asked.
"Yes," Huff answered, and then surprised him by turning to O'Toole. "Sorry, Mikey," he added. "You know who my choice would have been."
After the athletic directors, Karp called Steele Dalton to the stand. When the young man was situated, Karp handed him a copy of the partial transcript that had been presented to the ACAA panel. After giving the young man a minute to read the transcript, he asked, "Would you say that is a complete record of your conversation with Mr. Larkin?"
"Hell, no," Dalton answered. "A lot of stuff got left out."
"What do you mean by that?" Karp asked.
"I was pretty nervous when the ACAA investigator guy was asking me the questions," Dalton said. "So I was just sort of going, like, 'uh-huh' because I wasn't sure what he wanted."
"Was there any particular reason you were nervous?" Karp asked as if this were the first he'd heard of the claim.
"Well, yeah," Dalton replied, pointing to where Larkin was examining his fingernails at the defense table. "He's a big guy and the ACAA can mess you up as a player if you get on their bad side. Even before he turned on the tape recorder, he sort of got in my face and said I'd be in a lot of trouble if I lied to protect Coach O'Toole. He said he knew for sure that Coach O'Toole knew about the party and had paid for it. He also said that the underage drinking and sex stuff might hurt my eligibility if I didn't cooperate with the ACAA."
"And this was not recorded?"
"No, it was not," Dalton replied. "Only after he said all that stuff did he turn on the recorder and that's when I just sort of said whatever would get me out of there. But even then we had to stop and start over when he didn't like the way I said my answers."
"What do you mean by that?"
"Well, for instance, he asked me if Coach O'Toole had approved of the party," Dalton answered. "I told him the truth and that was that. When Rufus showed up at the dormitory, Rufus told me that Coach O'Toole sent him to take me and Mike Mason to a party for 'special' recruits."
"What was Mr. Larkin's reaction?"
"I could tell he didn't like it," Dalton replied. "Then he asked me if I was aware that Coach O'Toole had paid for the alcohol and strippers."
"And what did you reply?"
"Again, I said, 'That's what Rufus told me,' I had no way of knowing that myself," he said. "Coach O'Toole never said any of that to my face."
"What did Coach O'Toole tell you and the other recruits?" Karp asked.
"At the end of the day, he thanked us for coming," Dalton said, "and said he hoped that we'd consider the University of Northwest Idaho. He then sent us to dinner with the team but said we had to be back in the dormitory, lights out, by ten p.m."