Book Description

In Book One of this series, the author takes you through the history of the storied Bellevue football program, starting at the beginnings of the high school, back in the 1920s. Seen through the eyes of the author, the book then takes you through many decades of football seasons leading up to the Butch Goncharoff regime at Bellevue High School. As Butch develops that program into a national powerhouse, the author documents events that occurred in the Bellevue High Schoolprogram, such as the upset of De La Salle that ended their 151-game winning streak, the upset of Long Beach Poly, a national championship in 2012, a 67-game winning streak of their own, and the success that ultimately spearheaded various investigations into the program over the years. Book One meticulously examines the many falsities and bad facts contained within the now infamous "Diploma Mill" article of August 2015 by the Seattle Times. This very damaging article is scrutinized in the book, and accusations and assumptions brought forward in that article are put to the test. The Bellevue football story became national news in 2016 as false accusations of recruiting by the twelve-time state champions and 2012 national champions took center stage. This fake news reporting in the media hammered down on the program until the program was literally ripped apart at the seams. There was no avenue for the coaches and community to fight back as the Bellevue School District leadership waffled back and forth, and the only major newspaper in town relentlessly focused on this high school football program and taking it down. Book one of the series fights back against the missteps by the school district, the fake news from the Seattle Times, and examines the unethical tactics utilized by the state's governing body (the WIAA) in setting up an investigation. The book examines the lack of candor from the executive director of the WIAA who removed all of the rules for factfinding just prior to the investigation, and chose not to inform the Bellevue School District that these rules had just recently been removed. It also discusses how the WIAA chose two former federal prosecutors to run the investigation and how these two prosecutors failed to disclose their very real and material conflict of interest they had with regard to the key witness against the Bellevue football program whom one of them had indicted a number of years earlier. The prosecutors used this convicted felon who had become an informant for the FBI following this indictment as a major witness and source during their investigation, but never disclosed this inherent conflict to the WIAA or the Bellevue School District as it would have meant they would have not been able to perform this very high profile investigation due to their conflict of interest with a Bellevue High School parent whom they had previously indicted. Book one of the series culminates with the selection of the two former federal prosecutors who were clearly not properly vetted by the WIAA and sets the table for the investigation that followed which is described in great detail in book two of the series.