The Sports Blotter by Matt Taibbi

JUWANNA LAUGH?

Did you hear the one about the freaky-ass looking Zimbabwean man with a receding hairline who got busted for competing in female events? The real-life version of Juwanna Mann, featuring a protagonist uglier by a factor of at least four than the movie version, hit theaters everywhere last week when Mduduzi Ngwenya – better known in Africa as star female runner Samukeliso Sithole – made his/her first appearance in court to stand trial for "impairing the dignity" of female athletes.

One of the problems with this sort of crime is that it is very hard to confine your transgressions to the root offense. All you want to do is cheat at sports, but you very quickly veer into the abyss of peeping and sex crime. That's what happened to Ngwenya, who back in January made the mistake of befriending a female runner named Mudondiro, from the town of Kwekwe. Ngwenya, having assumed her female identity of Sithole, visited Mudondiro and walked in on her as she was undressing to have a bath (this is the exciting part of the story). Some time later, a security guard from the Kwekwe train station spotted Ngwenya and pointed him/her out as an imposter, having recognized him as a male runner he had known from the town of Silobela. This led to complaints from Mudondiro and others, and subsequently the trial.

Now here's where the case gets really interesting. Prosecutors at the trial took the extraordinary step of summoning two doctors (two, not one) to testify that an examination of Ngwenya's genitalia revealed him to be male. That would seem to have closed the book on that subject – but Ngwenya had an answer for the court. He claimed that the reason had had a penis was because it had been put there by a witch doctor whom he owed $5 million. The faith-healer, he said, had made his female genitalia "disappear" and had replaced them with a penis. The runner then inspired roars of laughter when he offered to call in boyfriends with whom he'd had "normal" sexual relations.

Ngwenya, of course, was no Teena Brandon. In trying to pass as a woman he was looking not for love but for racing medals (he won seven gold and one silver in regional competitions). When not stealing races, he occasionally just stole things in general. In one of the strangest lists of contraband you'll ever see in print, Ngwenya is also accused, according to various African news reports, of having stolen "48 bars of brown washing soap, one pair of blue jeans, 10 kg of sugar, four audio cassettes, a white T-shirt and $100 000" from a former boyfriend. 48 bars of soap, a t-shirt, and... $100,000? Why even mention the soap? Guess that's why they call them foreign...

 

PINE PIRATE

Had the police never been called in the epitaph on Brad Lohaus's career might have read as follows: was both the first, and the worst, of the "next Larry Bird" draft prospects to stink up the NBA. Before Darko there was Keith Van Horn; before Van Horn there was Chris Laettner and Toni Kukoc; before both of those guys there was Detlef Schrempf and Tom Chambers. But no "next Larry Bird" turned out to be less like Larry Bird than Brad Lohaus, a gangly goon from Iowa who had the misfortune not only to be a blond, curly-headed 6'10" 3-point shooter, but to be drafted by the Boston Celtics in 1988. He came to the Garden with high expectations, and left with a reputation for being the most lead-footed, aesthetically unappealing NBA big man since Dwayne Schintzus.

The 40 year-old Lohaus found himself splashed in Midwestern sports headlines last week when he was arrested for assaulting his 23 year-old girlfriend, McKinsey Gonder. The pair had been staying in a hotel when police had to intervene to break up an argument. Apparently, when Gonder at one point tried to leave the hotel, Lohaus grabbed her and got into what he later called a "wrestling match." Gordon was apparently a poor wrestler, as she ended up suffering a split lip, a bump on the head, and a few bruises. Lohaus was unscathed.

Police were forced to arrest Lohaus for two reasons; one, he drew blood, and two, the pair have a child together, making this case an automatic domestic abuse situation under Iowa law.

Lohaus was already in trouble, incidentally. He was scheduled stand trial on Aug. 22 for the increasingly popular jock crime of posting items worth $1970 for sale on eBay and then never sending the merchandise after it was sold. Talk about fitting: on trial for unfulfilled promise.

 

PAC-MAN BLUES

Adam "Pac Man" Jones, the much-ballyhooed alleged shutdown corner draft choice of the Tennessee Titans, screwed up badly last week, inspiring the latest arrest on that crime-stricken squad.

Jones was charged with assault and felony vandalism after he reportedly attacked nightclub owner Robert Gaddy, who had tried to throw Jones and his friends out because "they were smoking drugs."

Gaddy was the wrong person to pick on– reportedly a friend of Steve McNair's. This is apparently the third incident involving Jones and police in the past three months, but the first that wasn't hushed up. We'll keep you posted...

 

QUANTITY, NOT QUALITY

The sports blotter is overwhelmed this week with violations, mostly all of a minor variety. July typically represents the high-water mark in yearly athlete arrests, for the simple reason that pro and college football teams are neither playing nor practicing. The six-week window in the NFL schedule means roughly 1700 of the world's most unstable millionaires are roaming free, feeling neither injured nor exhausted. This tends to make for a busy time for policemen, particularly in resort communities. Anyway by way of adjusting to the crime cycle, we're going to change things up a bit this week and bring you twice the number of arrests, in the same space. That's a 200% value! And to conserve column inches, each crime is going to be summarized in the ultra-economical Haiku style, before details are given. Here goes:

SHE JUST WOULDN'T LISTEN

Randy McMichael Threw his wife out of his car Again and again

The Dolphins' tight end, readers may or may not recall, was arrested just over a year ago for almost exactly the same crime. Only last year, Cawanna McMichael was pregnant when Randy went off on her. This year, at least four witnesses reportedly saw McMichael throwing Cawanna out of the couple's 1984 Coupe De Ville. When police intervened, Cawanna claimed the incident was an accident, that she received a bloody nose when she was inadvertently struck by junk McMichael was throwing out of his moving Caddy. Whatever, Randy. Freshman coach Nick Saban said he certainly wouldn't condone the conduct that had been alleged, but had no specific comment, yada, yada yada.

 

TIGER BURNING BRIGHT

Benjamin Pittman Punched some dude who had fondled A girl's ripe young breasts.

The 6'4", 258-pound LSU defensive end, groomed as the replacement for recently-drafted stud DE Marcus Spears, was involved in an altercation at Bogie's Bar and Grill in Baton Rouge. Police arrived at the scene to find a man lying on the ground with "one eye swollen shut." When interrogations of witnesses led them to Pittman, who had already left the scene, the gridiron star explained that he had intervened only when the alleged victim had grabbed the breasts of a girl at the bar. Police have yet to sort out whose girlfriend the girl in question was. LSU spokeshumans, like their former boss Saban, declined "specific comment."

 

HE SMOKES WITH A HOLDER

Call him Jonathan; Buckeye kicker, and also Stoned out of his mind.

Jonathan Skeete that is. The Ohio State kicker was formally indicted last week on two felony counts of marijuana trafficking. In a testament to the supernatural levels of boredom that must be afflicting Ohio drug enforcement officials, the placekicker was arrested in May after being nabbed selling weed to undercover agents in a sting operation. Skeete's attorney declined comment, except to say that Skeete was "a good student and a good person." Both at the same time, imagine that. Meanwhile, in the latest development in what has been a highly troublesome offseason at OSU, sophomore defensive tackle Brandon Maupin was taken off the team for the year for academic issues. It also came out that Maupin owed the city of Columbus $1,943 for 36 parking tickets. No big loss: Maupin played in four games last year and registered no tackles.

 

CRIMINOLE-D HAT

Having seen it all Coach Bowden, of Ernie Sims, Said, "This too shall pass."

Hey, when you coach the Florida State Seminoles, the gold standard of arrest-gathering sports organizations, you learn to roll with the punches a little. Two weeks ago, FSU linebacker Ernie Sims was arrested for slamming his 5'2", 118-pound girlfriend to the ground, then also for resisting arrest. Sims ended up being charged only with a misdemeanor, which to coach Bobby Bowden means only one thing: he's available for the first game! When asked on his brother Terry's radio show if Sims's arrest would lead to a loss of playing time, Bowden cracked, "This, too, shall pass." In Tallahassee, you can joke about this stuff! In other 'Nole news, quarterback Wyatt Sexton – who just a few weeks back was discovered wandering the streets in a state of apparently drug-induced derangement – has been diagnosed with Lyme disease, and will miss the whole season. Police are already preparing an indictment, with the crime to be filled in later, for whoever his replacement will be.

 

IT'S ME, EDDIE

Nightclub parking lot A tussle; booze, pepper spray Violates parole.

The much-hyped Eddie Griffin, heir apparent to all-time NBA crime great Isaiah Rider, is set to do a 15-day jail stint after violating his parole. The T-Wolves forward/center, one of the most talented athletes in the league, has already been arrested for deadly conduct, aggravated assault, punching a woman, and also shooting at a woman after she entered his home and caught him in flagrante with another female companion. As a condition of his parole, Griffin was to avoid "persons or places of disreputable or harmful character." Apparently the crowd at a Houston nightclub parking lot, where Griffin was last weekend, qualified; police had to intervene to subdue a group of men bent on assaulting one of Griffin's friends. Eddie will likely do the 15 days, even though police contend he was doing nothing wrong in the incident.