Police Hesitant to Label Death of Alabama Booster A Homicide
MEMPHIS Tenn.
Police backed off calling the death of a University of Alabama football booster a homicide Wednesday, a day after investigators said he died in a fierce, bloody struggle.
A police statement referred to a continuing “death investigation” and said a ruling from the medical examiner into the cause and manner of death was pending.
The statement did not explain the change or whether investigators were considering possibilities other than murder.
Logan Young, who was convicted last year of bribing a high school football coach, was found dead at his Memphis home Tuesday. No arrests had been made and no suspects had been identified.
“We’re still waiting on the medical examiner’s report,” police Sgt. Vince Higgins says. “And quite frankly, right now, even if she ruled it a murder, we wouldn’t have probable cause enough to charge anyone.”
Crime scene crews spent most of two days in Young’s house, where police say blood or traces of blood were found in several rooms.
Young, a 65-year-old multimillionaire and longtime booster of Crimson Tide football, was convicted on federal charges last year of paying a high school coach up to $150,000 to send a top recruit to Alabama.
The conviction for money laundering and racketeering conspiracy capped a scandal that put Alabama on NCAA probation and cost Young his favored standing among the university’s big-money boosters.
Young, who was divorced, lived alone much of the time. His son, Logan Young III, an only child, apparently had been staying with him off and on recently, police said.
Logan Young III was not at the residence when his father’s body was found by a housekeeper. He was located several hours later and taken to police headquarters for questioning. There, he voluntarily gave DNA samples to investigators, including fingernail scrapings, said defense lawyer Steve Farese.
Farese said his client denied any part in the death.
“He was not involved in any way and found out about it watching television,” Farese said.
On his federal conviction in June, Young was sentenced to six months in prison plus six months home confinement. He was appealing the conviction and had not yet begun serving the sentence.
Former high school coach Lynn Lang, who avoided jail time by pleading guilty to conspiracy, says Young paid him thousands of dollars in cash to get defensive lineman Albert Means to sign with Alabama in 2000.
Means was not accused of wrongdoing. He stayed at Alabama one season before transferring to Memphis.
Means’ recruitment became part of an NCAA investigation that resulted in sanctions against Alabama, and the university announced that Young was no longer welcome as a booster.
— Associated Press
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