Thursday, August 23, 2012

Is NCAA abusing discovery process in O'Bannon v. NCAA? Sonny Vaccaro targeted

Jon Solomon of The Birmingham News writes today about the NCAA targeting Sonny Vaccaro, an unpaid adviser to Ed O'Bannon's legal team in the former UCLA star's class action lawsuit against the NCAA.  O'Bannon's case is in discovery and the NCAA wants tons of records from Vaccaro, whom the NCAA describes in disparaging ways:
Court documents filed in June show that the NCAA wants records from Vaccaro. The NCAA says they're relevant to the players' claims they can't sell their likenesses. The NCAA's attorneys use words like "agent," "runner" and "broker" to paint Vaccaro's livelihood coming off the backs of players. 

The players' attorneys say Vaccaro criticized the NCAA long before this suit, and that the NCAA hasn't denied investigating Vaccaro and now wants to accuse him of improprieties.
"This is scorched-earth litigation," the players write. 

Counters the NCAA: "Vaccaro and his organization are at the heart of decisions and financial careers of former student athletes. Vaccaro's participation in gathering plaintiffs is directly relevant to the merits of the claims as well as the qualifications of the class members." 
 For more, click here.

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