WASHINGTON — The uncle of a 19-year-old University of Maryland football player who was hospitalized May 29 and died June 13 said the school is responsible for Jordan McNair’s death.
“University of Maryland, they killed my nephew,” William Tarrant told NBC Washington. “That training staff, them people, they killed my nephew.”
Tuesday, the president of the university, Wallace Loh, said the school accepts “legal and moral responsibility” for the heatstroke-related death of McNair last spring, and formally apologized to the player’s family.
Statement via the McNair family lawyers: pic.twitter.com/7Z5GcPV9X1
— Nicole Auerbach (@NicoleAuerbach) August 14, 2018
Tarrant said he cut his nephew’s hair the day before he began Maryland football training.
“The next time I saw him was when I was cutting his hair, to get him ready for his funeral,” Tarrant told NBC 4. “I never thought I would never see that boy alive again.”
In a news conference with Loh, University of Maryland Athletic Director Damon Evans said McNair was not diagnosed appropriately.
“Heat illness was not properly identified or treated,” Evans said. “Our athletic training staff did not take Jordan’s temperature, and did not apply a cold water immersion treatment.”
The final report into McNair’s death is being compiled by a four-person panel, including two judges, and an attorney who took part in investigations of steroid use in Major League Baseball.
The report is expected by Sept. 15.
McNair’s attorney, Billy Murphy, Jr. said a lawsuit will be filed on behalf of the family, likely after the completion of the university’s report.
