Contact:
Douglas E. Abrams (573) 882-0307 [email protected]
Rajah Maples Wallace, Senior Information Specialist
(573) 882-3346 [email protected]
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MU PROFESSOR COMMENTS ON THE DEATH OF A HOCKEY PLAYER'S DAD AND VIOLENCE IN YOUTH SPORTS
COLUMBIA, Mo. -- After a Massachusetts youth ice hockey game last week, one player's father beat an opposing player's father while the 10-year-olds watched. The attacker was angry about rough play during the game. The victim, a 40-year-old father of four, lapsed into a coma and died after being removed from life support.
"With the behavior of so many youth sports parents spiraling downward in recent years, it was only a matter of time before someone was killed," said Douglas E. Abrams, University of Missouri-Columbia law professor.
According to Abrams, adult confrontations have become commonplace in youth leagues, frequently controlled only when police are summoned to restore order. Brawling parents have even disrupted preschoolers' T-ball games. The parents usually emerge with little more than hurt feelings, cuts and bruises, and an occasional broken nose or split lip. Their bewildered children leave the event thoroughly embarrassed by the spectacle.
Abrams has been a youth hockey coach for 31 years. In addition to serving as president of the Jefferson City youth hockey program, he has received numerous awards for working for and with youth. He received the 1994 Meritorious Service to the Children of America Award, recognizing his excellence in teaching juvenile law, his public service on children's legal issues, and his years of working with children as a youth-league ice hockey coach. Since 1968, he has coached more than 4,000 youngsters on winter hockey teams, New England summer hockey camps and at fall weekend instructional clinics in the Midwest and Northeast.
Abrams has written numerous published articles on youth-sports. He graduated from Wesleyan University in 1973 with highest honors, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and won a Scholar-Athlete Award. He earned his law degree from Columbia University in 1976.
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