Bobby Petrino
The University of Arkansas football coach lost his job after he admitted lying about a motorcycle accident to cover up his relationship with a recently hired staff member.Bobby Petrino was suspended with pay pending an investigation as coach of the Arkansas Razorbacks last evening after atheletic director Jeff Long learned Petrino lied to him. Petrino mentioned he had crashed his motorcycle, but failed to mention he had Jessica Dorrell riding on the back of that motorcycle at the time of the crash, but was forced to disclose Dorrell’s involvement in the crash after the police accident report was made public. Petrino said he had been concerned about protecting his family and keeping an “inappropriate relationship from becoming public.” Petrino said:
“The state police report today provides an accurate description of my accident, which includes details that had not publically come to light prior to the report being issued. I regret that I have not publically acknowledged a passenger on the vehicle. I have been in constant pain, medicated and the circumstances involving the wreck have come out in bits and pieces. That said I certainly had a concern about Jessica Dorrell’s name being revealed. In my press conference, I referred to her simply as ‘a lady’. My concern was to protect my family and a previous inappropriate relationship from becoming public. In hindsight, I showed a serious mistake in judgment when I chose not to be more specific about those details. Today, I’ve acknowledged this previous inappropriate relationship with my family and those within the athletic department administration.”
“I apologize to my wife, Becky, and our four children, Chancellor Gearhart, Jeff Long, the Board of Trustees, University administration, my coaching staff, student-athletes and the entire state of Arkansas. I have been humbled by the outpouring of concern and get-well wishes. I apologize to the Razorback Nation for the attention my actions have brought to the University of Arkansas and our program. I will fully cooperate with the University throughout this process and my hope is to repair my relationships with my family, my Athletic Director, the Razorback Nation and remain the head coach of the Razorbacks.”
Petrino is married with four children. Dorrell is engaged to marry Josh Morgan, and she has an MBA, so she is smart enough to know what she was doing, sleeping her way up the ladder.
Petrino suffered four broken ribs, and a cracked neck vertebrae that requires a continuous neck brace. Dorrell was uninjured.
Petrino signed a new seven-year contract in December 2010 after completing his third regular season at Arkansas. The contract, which was for an average of $3.53 million annually, had a clause in it that would allow Arkansas to dismiss Petrino for “engaging in conduct, as solely determined by the university, which is clearly contrary to the character and responsibilities of a person occupying the position of head football coach or which negatively or adversely affects the reputation of the university’s athletics programs in any way.”
The police report includes a 25 year old female passenger named Jessica Dorrell.
She was recently hired to his staff after working with the Razorback Foundation for the last couple years.
Jessica Dorrell is engaged to Josh Morgan and her wedding is scheduled for June 9, 2012.
Jessica Dorrell and Bobby Petrino were picked up by a passing car at the scene of the accident and dropped off at the corner of Crossover and Huntsville road.
Petrino was picked up by Arkansas State Trooper Captain Lance King who is assigned as his security during football season and taken to Physicians’ Specialty Hospital in Fayetteville.
Bobby Petrino was released from the Hospital on Tuesday and returned to practice the same day.
Money and ego make you think you are invincible, for example Jack Welch, Warren Buffett, Bill Clinton, Tiger Woods, Bobby Petrino, most of Hollywood, Wilbur Mills, Eliot Spitzer, etc, etc, etc. Only women are good enough liars to get away with cheating, and when they do get caught it’s all the man’s fault, and the man even takes the blame, begs for forgiveness, and begs the cheater to stay. Pure stupidity.
Update 4-10-2012: Arkansas State Police today released further information after a detailed report from State Trooper Captain Lance King, who was assigned as personal security for coach Bobby Petrino, but as an official part of his state trooper job. King’s supervisors requested a much more detailed report about Petrino’s accident, and it was this report that led to Bobby Petrino being fired from his coaching job. As mentioned above, Patrino’s contract with the University of Arkansas had a morality clause that allowed the University to fire Petrino for lying about the details of his accident, and concealing the fact his mistress, Jessica Dorrell, was a passenger.
There is no doubt in my mind that Petrino is going to be dismissed as the head coach of the Arkansas Razorbacks football program.
He should be. The man is unfit to coach, especially at the college level.
Young men and women entering into college—especially the kind of high-profile student athletes that Petrino led—need someone with high character and impeccable morals to help guide them through one of the most important phases of their precious lives.
Petrino is the antithesis of this profile. He has continually proven over a long period of time that he's a man of loose morals, to say the least.In 2003, his first year as a head coach at the University of Louisville, Petrino went behind the back of his employer and his onetime boss, Tuberville, to negotiate a deal replacing him at Auburn...Petrino lied about having any contact with Auburn officials -- until two reporters for The (Louisville) Courier-Journal confronted him with documentation of the private plane that brought the university president and athletic director into Petrino's backyard...Boxed into a corner, Petrino asked forgiveness and chalked it up to the inexperience of a "young coach."In 2004, Petrino interviewed for the Notre Dame job and had discussions with Florida and Mississippi about their jobs. Then, on Dec. 7, he pledged his loyalty to Louisville.
Eliot J. Schechter/Getty Images
On Dec. 21, Petrino signed an enhanced contract to stay with the Cardinals.
On Dec. 26 -- well before the Petrino children had graduated from high school -- he interviewed with LSU to replace Saban. On Jan. 1, 2005, when it became obvious that he'd lost out to Les Miles, Petrino pulled out of consideration.
On the inside, several Louisville administrators were disappointed they had to keep him. They were sick of the game -- but there was no firing a guy who just went 12-1.
So he's good at coaching. He gets results. I can see how people in need of a good coach would be willing to overlook these character defects.
But there's more, per Forde:
In 2005, Petrino interviewed with the Oakland Raiders. That's after telling people for years that he had no interest in coaching the pros -- college was where he wanted to be. He ultimately turned down the job and professed his commitment to the Cardinals again.
Then, on July 13, 2006, Petrino signed a 10-year contract worth up to $25 million with Louisville, even going so far as to putting a $1 million buyout in his contract, saying:
We did want to make a statement… I wanted to make sure everyone understood -- I know I've said it -- that this is where I want to be, where my family wants to be. But I want everyone to really believe it.Of course, it was only five months later that he signed a five-year $24 million contract with Arthur Blank and the Atlanta Falcons. We all know how that one turned out.
Petrino was gone within a year, headed off to Arkansas.
And now, here we are again talking about Petrino and his incredible lack of character and judgment.
Not only was he cheating on his family, but he hired his lover to become the university's student athlete coordinator just days before getting into the motorcycle accident that exposed his latest lies (H/T ABC News).
After the accident, Petrino then lied to the police about Dorrell's involvement in the crash, saying that she had somehow rescued him from the crash instead of the truth that she was riding on the bike when the crash happened.
Granted, Petrino panicked. Still, he should have never been doing what he was doing in the first place. Hiring his mistress by itself is a demonstration of a lapse in moral character.
The Razorbacks coach was put on paid administrative leave on Thursday night less than seven hours after his boss, athletic director Jeff Long, learned Petrino had failed to disclose he had been riding with a female employee half his age when his motorcycle skidded off the road over the weekend.
Petrino said he had been concerned about protecting his family and keeping an "inappropriate relationship from becoming public."
It was a stunning revelation for a highly successful coach who prides himself on complete control and intense privacy in his personal life. Petrino will now wait out his fate while Long conducts a review.I will fully cooperate with the university throughout this process and my hope is to repair my relationships with my family, my athletic director, the Razorback Nation and remain the head coach of the Razorbacks," he said in a statement issued by the university.
Long announced the decision to put Petrino on leave at a late-night news conference, one that was reminiscent of when the former Atlanta Falcons coach was hired by the Razorbacks on Dec. 11, 2007. Long said he had no timeline in determining Petrino's future with the Razorbacks.
"I'm at the beginning of the review. I don't know what I'm going to find," Long said. "I am disappointed that coach Petrino did not share with me, when he had the opportunity to, the full extent of the accident and who was involved."
Long said he didn't hear about the passenger -- former Arkansas volleyball player and current football program employee Jessica Dorrell, who is 25 -- until the 51-year-old Petrino called him Thursday afternoon, minutes before a police report was released that disclosed her presence at the accident.
Assistant head coach Taver Johnson has been put in charge of the program. Long's investigation could lead, based on conduct clauses in Petrino's contract, to a suspension or firing.
"I hope to have a resolution soon," Long said. "I certainly don't have all the answers here tonight, as we meet. But again, I have an obligation and responsibility to obtain the information and then act appropriately on that information."
Petrino, who is married with four children, didn't mention he had a passenger during a news conference on Tuesday, two days after Sunday's accident, and a school statement that day quoted Petrino's family as saying "no other individuals" were involved. Petrino said then that he had spent Sunday with his wife, Becky, at a lake and was going for an evening ride. His only mention of Dorrell was vague, and without identification.
That source says John L. Smith is coming back on an interim basis to replace Bobby Petrino.
Smith left the Razorbacks last season to become the coach at Weber State. He's said to be returning for a one-year appointment.
Smith is also a former head coach at Michigan State.
Petrino was fired April 10 after his affair with a woman he hired as his assistant was revealed by an April 1 motorcycle crash.
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