Chatham High School football player Preston D. Turner went from being a record-breaking star of the team last August to being suspended just two months later on accusations he assaulted an assistant football coach.
His parents, grandmother and members of the Ministerial Alliance of Danville are now crying foul, saying the incident was blown out of proportion and that events since have shown the treatment of the player was based on racism.
“What we seem to be having here is the most egregious racial railroading of a prominent black high school athlete,” local NAACP chapter member Anita Royston said during a news conference Wednesday.
Pittsylvania County Schools Superintendent Mark Jones, reached after the news conference, said he could not comment on anything in student records.
“We do follow a code of conduct, and we take a lot of time to investigate [incidents],” Jones said. “But because it’s a student matter, I just can’t comment on it.”
During the news conference, at WKBY Radio in Chatham, father Preston A. Turner said his son was at a practice at which younger players practiced with the varsity team when the incident happened. Preston D. Turner, now a senior, was not at the conference.
The father said it began when an eighth-grader grabbed his son’s facemask, and his son had words with the younger student, telling him that was not an allowed move.
An assistant coach stepped in and stopped the discussion, with Preston D. Turner jokingly saying, “You next?”
The father said it was something of a team catch-phrase, something they regularly said to each other.
Practice resumed, with the assistant coach joining another coach on the field.
As the younger Turner ran down the field during the next drill, the coaches were in his way, his father explained. One got out of the way, but the other — the assistant coach — instead went into the “broke down” defensive stance and got knocked over by the player.
The aftermath of the that event saw Preston D. Turner suspended for 10 days, missing the last football game of the year. He was also told not to attend the football awards dinner, his father said.
Preston A. Turner said his son was stripped of all his awards, though he was told his state record of nine touchdowns in one game, would hold, but would be awarded quietly, at a later date.
“My son needs to be recognized in front of his peers and the public,” the father said, with his voice choking up. “I want to see him walk across that stage [at graduation] and get his accolades.”
When the student athlete returned to school after the suspension ended, he learned he would not be able to play basketball because 80 hours of community service had been added to his punishment.
The student’s awards, list of accomplishments and scholastic achievements were stripped out of the yearbook before it was printed, his father said.
All of that was bad enough to try and combat. Efforts to set the record straight have been unsuccessful, said his mother Alicia Turner.
His father noted that football is a contact sport.
“Coaches challenge players regularly. How can he be reprimanded when this is past practices?” Preston A. Taylor said.
When the athlete went out for baseball in the spring, another incident arose that showed a stark contrast to how different “misbehaving” students are treated, his father said.
While the younger Turner helped some players and coaches remove a tarp from a wet and muddy field, other players had found a chain and shaped it into a noose.
When he entered the dugout, they taunted him, showing the noose and asking if it was a good day for a lynching.
He walked away, changed into clean, dry clothes and returned to the field — only to find that his glove had been filled with mud and worms.
The students involved in that incident, all white, did get a couple of days of suspension, had to write an essay and had to replace the younger Turner’s glove, his father said.
Royston, also WKBY’s community relations representative, called the treatment of Preston D. Turner a clear sign of racism.
She pointed out that rather than seeing colleges lined up to recruit Preston D. Turner, the accusation of assault in his records has resulted in no offers.
Willie Fitzgerald, president of the Pittsylvania County Chapter of the NAACP, said he is willing to work with the Turners and investigate this case.
To his family, it all boils down to one thing: “I want everything taken from him to be replaced,” said his grandmother, Faye Turner.