The NCAA has charged a former Georgia Tech assistant coach with Level 1 violation for a visit to a strip club that involved current Chicago Bulls rookie Wendell Carter Jr. and former Georgia Tech and NBA player Jarrett Jack, ESPN reports.
Jack, who acted on behalf of the NCAA as a booster for Georgia Tech’s athletic interests, also purportedly gave Carter and another unnamed then-Georgia Tech player $300 for the strip club.
Former assistant Darryl LaBarrie; Jarrett Jack; and Ron Bell, an ex-friend of Yellow Jackets basketball coach Josh Pastner, have been charged with multiple alleged offenses, including Level 1 violations, the most severe under the NCAA. The NCAA found that the incident occurred in November 2016, six months after LaBarrie was hired as Pastner’s assistant coach.
On Friday, Georgia Tech shared a redacted report of the NCAA’s notice of charges.
Georgia Tech announced on Friday that it had received a notice of allegations from the NCAA.
On Thursday night, insiders told ESPN that Georgia Tech does not face a charge of lack of institutional control, and Pastner hasn’t been accused of “failure to promote an atmosphere of compliance nor failure to monitor his staff,” the site wrote.
“Josh cooperated fully with the NCAA investigation and he has not been charged with any violations,” Pastner's attorney told ESPN.
A 13-year NBA veteran, Jack signed to the New Orleans Pelicans a week before training camp, but was released by the team in October and hasn’t played this season at all.
LaBarrie has been charged with “offering impermissible recruiting benefits” and “failure to cooperate and unethical and dishonest conduct,” per ESPN. He’s also being implicated in offering false and misleading information to NCAA investigators and Georgia Tech officials about what he knew regarding the alleged strip club incident. Additionally, he’s being accused of attempting to persuade the player to also offer misleading information to investigators.
LaBarrie was subsequently placed on administrative leave in November 2017, and permanently left that season.
Ron Bell faces a charge of offering impermissible recruiting violations after he purportedly bought airline tickets for former Georgia Tech players Josh Okogie and Tadric Jackson to Arizona, where Bell lived. He also allegedly tried to influence former Memphis player Markel Crawford to come to Tech. The NCAA found that Bell gave Okogie and Jackson more than $1,400 in clothing, food, and travel.
This is the third time Georgia Tech’s athletics department will stand in front of the NCAA infractions committee since 2011.
