A would-be sports marketer filed suit against Reggie Bush yesterday in San Diego Superior Court, seeking repayment of $291,600 from Bush and his family for alleged unpaid rent, a vehicle and other goods.
Running back Reggie Bush said he and his family did nothing wrong when he was at USC and that they will be exonerated.
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The suit, filed on behalf of plaintiff Lloyd Lake, is expected to be a watershed event in the NCAA's investigation into whether Bush and his family received impermissible benefits from the aspiring marketing agency while Bush was at USC. The NCAA and Lake now are scheduled to meet Friday in Los Angeles.
The suit had been threatened since the spring of 2006, holding up the NCAA's investigation because neither side wanted to show its cards to the other through the NCAA. The suit says money was given to the family from November 2004 through January 2006, Bush's sophomore and junior football seasons.
“They had fallen on hard times financially and required immediate and significant financial assistance to support their respective lifestyles,” the suit states.
The suit states Bush “reaffirmed his commitment to repay (Lake) in a written communication.”
It is an NCAA violation for student-athletes or their families to accept benefits from prospective agents.
Bush's attorney, David Cornwell, did not immediately return a call seeking comment.
Settlement talks between Bush and Lake failed this summer.
Lake, a Bush family friend, and another former investor, Michael Michaels, had claimed that Bush and his stepfather wanted their help in starting a marketing agency that would represent Bush once he turned pro. In the meantime, while Bush was at USC, Lake and Michaels claimed they provided the family with $100,000 in cash disbursements and were out nearly $300,000 in out-of-pocket expenses to help start the agency, New Era Sports, according to Lake's attorney, Brian Watkins.
Bush's parents also lived at a house Michaels owned in Spring Valley without paying rent for a year, Watkins said.
The deal evaporated and became public after Bush decided to go with a different marketing agent, Mike Ornstein, which left Lake and Michaels feeling spurned. The suit states that Bush and his family said they would not accept money from any other person or entity without notifying Lake. But the suit alleges the family accepted airfare and hotel expenses from somebody else (believed to be Ornstein's group) when they traveled to the USC-Cal game in 2005.
In April, Bush reached an undisclosed settlement with Michaels in which Michaels agreed not to sue Bush and not to talk about the case. That confidentiality agreement left NCAA investigators without a key witness in the case who could tell them firsthand about the family living in the house rent-free.
Though the NCAA had acquired a copy of the family's lease to the house, which calls for $4,500 monthly in rent, the NCAA needed proof rent wasn't paid – which could have been provided by Michaels, the landlord. Bush and his family also have not cooperated with the NCAA. Bush has said he and his family did nothing wrong and that they would be exonerated. Others associated with Bush attacked Lake's credibility because he is a documented gang member recently out of prison.
But Lake's cooperation and suit would give the NCAA direct testimony from an investor directly involved in the agency, plus possible court filings made under penalty of perjury and audiotapes said to exist of Bush's stepfather detailing financial arrangements with the agency.
If the NCAA would then find violations, Bush's Heisman Trophy and victories in which he played could be jeopardized.
Brent Schrotenboer:
(619) 293-1368
brent.schrotenboer@uniontrib.com
