INDIANAPOLIS --- Florida International University and the NCAA enforcement staff have agreed on all the facts surrounding the school's infractions case, allowing the Division I Committee on Infractions to make a ruling on the case without a formal hearing.

In its public infractions report, released August 25, the committee imposed a three-year probation against the institution and a three-year show cause penalty against a former assistant football coach.  These penalties are in addition to a list of penalties the institution already imposed upon itself. 

The case was submitted to the committee using the summary disposition process, a cooperative endeavor that allows institutions and the enforcement staff to submit joint findings to the committee.  A summary disposition is only used when the enforcement staff and institution agree on all of the facts in the case and that those facts constitute major violations.

This case involved impermissible workouts scheduled for offensive linemen in 2002, 2003 and 2004.  The former assistant coach scheduled three 60-90 minute workouts per week during spring and summer of those years, when it was impermissible for coaches to work with student-athletes.  The former assistant knew the workouts were impermissible.  The student-athletes participated in as many as 85.5 hours of impermissible workouts.

For his role in knowingly violating NCAA bylaws, the committee rendered a finding of unethical conduct against the former assistant coach.

The former assistant also included a number of other coaches in the workouts, a detail the committee found particularly troubling.

"The committee is troubled by the fact that none of the other staff members reported the activities to the compliance office or attempted to determine if the sessions were proper," the report states.  "All members of a coaching staff have an affirmative duty to ensure that an institution is operating with the NCAA rules."

The failure to report these activities to the compliance office led the committee to return a finding against the institution of failure to monitor its football program.

In determining what penalties to impose, the committee considered the institution's cooperation with investigators, corrective actions taken and self-imposed penalties, which included:

• Termination of the former assistant football coach.
• Elimination of the position of offensive line coach for the 2004-05 season and 2005 spring practice.  The team also operated one coach short of the Division I-A maximum during the 2004-05 season.
• The number of preseason fall camp practice sessions were reduced by four during August 2004.
• For each hour of impermissible activities (85.5 hours), the team forfeits two hours of mandatory practice.  So the teams loses 171 total practice hours during the 2004-05, 2005-06 and 2006-07 seasons. 
• The institution reduced by one the number of permissible off campus recruiters during the April 15 to May 31 evaluation period for 2005 and 2006.
• The institution shortened the athletic director's contract by six months and withheld a 2004-05 cost of living salary increase.  He also received a written reprimand.For the head football coach, strength coach and assistant football coaches, the institution withheld cost of living salary increases for 2004-05 and made them ineligible for merit increases for 2004-05 and 2005-06.  They are also required to attend NCAA compliance seminars and complete compliance tests.  In addition, the head football coach was prohibited from off campus recruiting for 2004-05.

The Committee on Infractions added a public reprimand and censure, the three-year probation against the institution and three-year show cause penalty against the former assistant coach to the self-imposed penalties.  Show cause requires any NCAA institution seeking to hire the former assistant to appear before the Committee on Infractions to determine whether his duties should be limited.