Coach Who Accused Jackie Robinson West Team of Cheating Sues Little League Baseball

EVERGREEN PARK, IL — The Evergreen Park coach who accused the 2014 Jackie Robinson West championship team of cheating is suing Little League Baseball International for severe emotional distress the group caused by originally rejecting his claims about the team, the Chicago Tribune reports.

The lawsuit brought by Chris Janes, vice president of the Evergreen Park Athletic Association Little League and coach of its 2014 team that lost to Jackie Robinson West, claims the organization intentionally and negligently inflicted emotional distress by dismissing him when he told officials that players on the city team should be ineligible because they knowingly lived outside approved boundaries, the report stated. Janes is seeeking more than $75,000 in damages, the report added.

But the organization then put Jackie West Robinson on probation, suspended its manager and took away the team's national title almost two months after Janes made his claims. The league claimed team officials had created fraudulent boundary maps and recruited players outside its borders.

That "cover-up," according to the lawsuit, was responsible for depression, anxiety, humiliation and other distress Janes suffered during that time, the Tribune reports. He also says he received death threats for speaking out.

Besides Janes' lawsuit, Little League Baseball also is being sued by the parents of the players on the Jackie Robinson West team, who claim the organization knew about the ineligible kids and ignored the issue in order to ride the wave of the team's success and popularity. Janes, as well as ESPN and network commentator Stephen A. Smith, also is named as defendant in the suit.

More via the Chicago Tribune

photo via Patch archives

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