Jury Says Thomas, Knicks, & MSG Guilty Of Sexual Harasment

In a a Manhattan courtroom early Tuesday morning a New York City jury ruled that the New York Knicks, the Madison Square Garden, MSG Chairman James Dolan, and the team’s President of Basketball Operations and head coach Isiah Thomas were guilty of sexually harassing a former team employee. Annucah Browne Sanders a former executive with the team sued the team and Thomas for sexual harassment and said that she had been fired in retaliation. The team and Thomas denied the allegations saying that the plaintiff had been fired because she was not competent.

The trial lasted three weeks, and revealed some rather graphic and shocking testimony from the plaintiff, a current female employee who admitted to having sex in a truck with a Knicks player. Stephon Marbury the player the Knicks employee had the encounter with in the truck testified. Thomas on videotape shown saying that Black men could say things to Black women (like calling them nasty names) that White men could never get away with. The plaintiff telling of how Thomas at first derided her with nasty names, and then after he beat her in a game of H-O-R-S-E that he fell in love with her even though she was married with a family.

Thomas was found to be not financially liable in spite of the ruling, the Knicks and MSG are however. A damage award hearing will be held later in the day. Another very ugly moment in a very ugly summer sports in the USA. And another punch in the gut for a league still reeling from the Tim Donaghy case that has every NBA Official under a magnifying glass. There has been no statement released from Thomas, the Knicks or the Garden at this time. U.S. District Court Judge Gerard Lynch was quoted by reporters on the scene that the verdict was “imminently reasonable.”