Former University of Texas women’s track coach Bev Kearney resigned two months ago after revelations surfaced she’d had a sexual relationship with one of her athletes in 2002. On Saturday, Kearney filed filed gender and race discrimination complaints with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Texas Workforce Commission claiming a double standard on the part of the UT Athletic Department. From the Austin American-Statesman’s Kirk Bohls :
Derek Howard, who represents Kearney, alleges that his client has been the victim of a double standard at the university. He claims he has knowledge of “in excess of 10” other instances of inappropriate relationships at Texas and said some of them are ongoing and others reach back a decade.
“I think the university turns a blind eye to these inappropriate relationships,” Howard told the Statesman. He offered no evidence of such relationships or details about the behaviors, and he declined to say whether they involved athletic department members.
Howard said he filed the gender and race discrimination complaint with the federal and state agencies last Tuesday. Howard said his complaint will reference only Texas co-offensive coordinator Major Applewhite, who is white and who admitted to an inappropriate consensual relationship with a female student trainer in 2009.
The Applewhite incident came to light within a month of its occurrence. He was reprimanded in writing, and his salary was frozen for a specific period.