Bob CollinsLast month, a Cretin-Derham Hall High School basketball player went to the free-throw line in a game against White Bear Lake High School when someone in the stands made “racially motivated noises,” the Pioneer Press reports.
Officials aren’t saying who the player was — citing data privacy laws — nor what the sound was. But it’s not hard to guess.
Yesterday, White Bear Lake officials sent a written apology to Cretin-Derham Hall, although it doesn’t know who it was in the audience who made the noises.
In fact, according to Marisa Vette, the White Bear Lake school district’s communications director, the initial investigation couldn’t determine there even was a racist remark.
“Separate interviews (were conducted) with those administrators and staff who were on site supervising the game, and a student leader of the fan section,” Vette wrote. “Based on those initial interviews, the administration was not able to substantiate the concern. None of those interviewed recalled hearing the noise described in the concern from (Cretin-Derham athletics director Jodi Loeblein-Lecker).”
That changed when the officials listened to a tape of the game and apparently heard what everybody else originally said they didn’t.
“The administration identified an inappropriate sound corresponding with the concern (from Loeblein-Lecker),” Vette said. “The investigation concluded that in all likelihood the sound came from a single spectator. The identification of this spectator is not currently known, but the investigation is ongoing.”
It’s not entirely clear how a tape of the game — and we’re assuming the microphone was far away from the audience — revealed the racist noises, but nobody sitting near the offender recalls hearing it.
