TAMPA, Fla. — David Mitchell, the football coach at Tampa’s Wharton High School, said the story published Monday by FanHouse about the incident concerning University of South Florida sophomore Joel Miller and Coach Jim Leavitt is “100 percent accurate” based on what Miller told him last week.
Mitchell, who also is an ordained deacon, was Miller’s coach at Wharton. Mitchell told FanHouse on Wednesday he stood by his original comments in the FanHouse report. “I’m not taking back anything I said to you on Sunday,” he said.
Mitchell and Paul Miller, Joel’s father, told FanHouse that Joel Miller told each of them he had been grabbed by the throat and struck twice in the face by Leavitt at halftime of the Louisville game on Nov. 21. Five members of the USF program also told FanHouse that they witnessed the incident and other members of USF’s program said Miller told them about the incident.
When asked about the incident Monday afternoon by FanHouse, Leavitt refused to discuss the allegations. “Things that happen or don’t happen usually are kept within the team — whether they happen or don’t happen,” he said.
After the FanHouse report was posted, Leavitt told local newspapers that he had never struck a player.
Gary Collins, who was Miller’s youth football coach and has known Miller since he was five, talks constantly to Miller. Collins would not comment to FanHouse about the incident …
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