TAC Bans Coach and 3 Athletes : Action Postponed Against Others Who Went to South Africa

In a precedent-setting move, a three-member panel voted unanimously Friday to suspend indefinitely three U.S. athletes and a coach who participated in a series of track and field meets in South Africa last month in defiance of an international ban.

The hearing, called by The Athletics Congress, the national governing body of track and field, was to have determined the fate of 16 of the athletes and coaches who participated in the tour, but 12 requested a later hearing, which the panel granted. The new hearing is set for Dec. 15 in the Los Angeles area.

But because the other four had not requested the change, their cases were heard Friday. Although they were invited to present their cases, the athletes and the coach were not present.

Suspended were Ray Wicksell of Phoenix, a distance runner formerly of Arizona State; Tom Hintnaus of El Segundo, a pole vaulter who has competed for Brazil; Tyrus Jefferson, a long jumper in his senior year at the University of Arkansas, and Dick Tomlinson of Live Oak, Calif., the tour’s organizer.

The suspensions are the first to be assessed against U.S. athletes for competing in South Africa, and officials believe this is only the second case--the Zola Budd affair last April being the first--in which track athletes have been sanctioned for participating in South African meets.

Because of its policy of racial separation, or apartheid, the Republic of South Africa was banned from the Olympic Games in 1964 and expelled from the International Amateur Athletic Federation (IAAF), which governs world track and field, in 1976.

Richard Hollander, the TAC general counsel and one of the panel members, said: “These people did in fact participate in track activities in South Africa in violation of the rules of both the IAAF and The Athletics Congress. For that reason, they have been suspended indefinitely.”

Hollander added that the suspensions could be appealed to the TAC board of directors, which will meet in March. He also said the outcome of the hearings Dec. 15 may change Friday’s suspensions--which were effective immediately and applicable to domestic and international competition.

“In a situation like this, you’ve got to be absolutely fair,” Hollander said. “We may hear something on Dec. 15 that will cause us to modify something. . . . None of us wants to close the door.”

Tomlinson, a former track coach, is not a member of TAC, and TAC officials said that under the sanctions, he would not likely be able to join. He would also be prevented from coaching TAC athletes.

One TAC official, explaining the sanctions against Tomlinson, said, “We didn’t think he should get away scot-free.”

Tom Tomlinson, Dick Tomlinson’s attorney and nephew, said Friday that he was not surprised at the outcome.

“We felt it was a foregone conclusion what would happen to everyone at those hearings,” Tomlinson said from his office in Chula Vista. He said he was unsure what his uncle would want to do now, but he ruled out civil action.

“That’s not what he wants to accomplish,” he said.

Tomlinson termed the status of his uncle’s suspension from an organization to which he didn’t belong as “an Alice in Wonderland type of situation.”

He added that since the IAAF rule prohibits only participation, his uncle broke no rules as an administrator for the tour.

“Not only is their rule over-broad,” Tomlinson said, “but their entire attack is over-broad.”

The definition of participation was broadened in the Budd case, when the IAAF determined that by attending a cross-country meet wearing athletic clothes and cheering for the runners, Budd, a native South African who became a British citizen, had broken the spirit of the rule.

The IAAF recommended that British track officials suspend Budd for at least a year, but Budd returned to South Africa before the suspension was applied. Friday’s action, therefore, marks the first time that athletes have been suspended for this violation.

The panel members said Friday that they had reviewed information received in letters and newspaper clippings to determine if the athletes had in fact participated in the meets.

Jefferson, of Tyler, Tex., had notified TAC that he would attend Friday’s hearing, but he did not show. Hollander said that Jefferson had written a letter stating that he had competed in South Africa and that he was suspended on that basis.

The 12 who will be asked to attend the December hearing:

Tom Petranoff of Oceanside, a 1988 Olympian and a former world record-holder in the javelin; John Powell of Cupertino, a two-time Olympic bronze medalist in the discus; Carol Cady of Stanford, a 1988 Olympian and the American record-holder in the discus; Ruth Wysocki of Canyon Lake, a 1984 Olympian at 800 and 1,500 meters; James Robinson of Oakland, a 1976 Olympian at 800 meters; Dave Laut of Oxnard, a former UCLA star and 1984 bronze medalist in the shotput; Milan Stewart of West Covina, a former National Collegiate Athletic Assn. champion hurdler from USC; Ted Banks, the coach at Riverside Community College, and four athletes from that school--sprinters Cedric Gilder and James Andrews, long jumper Kevin Atkins and hurdler Keith Thibodeaux.