Harbor May Appeal Ruling Against Football Program : Community colleges: Western State Conference bans team from postseason competition and places program on probation through 1994 season.

After nearly a week of investigations, the Western State Conference on Friday added more penalties to the Harbor College football team for its role in a brawl following a 23-0 loss to Pierce Sept. 25 at Wilmington. Pierce received no sanctions.

WSC Commissioner Aviva Kamin placed the Harbor football program on probation and banned the team from postseason play this year and next. The school also must file with the conference office a weekly written report after each football game outlining, among other things, the behavior of its staff and students at the games.

Both schools also were instructed to have either their athletic administrator or athletic director present at all football games. The administrator is required to remain at the game until all players and coaches have left.

The WSC also warned both schools that if a player or coach is ejected from a game this season--and next season, too, in Harbor’s case--for verbal or physical abuse, he will be suspended for the following game. The individual will be suspended for the remainder of the season for a second infraction.

The penalties come on top of Harbor’s decision to suspend its football program for a week. The team forfeited its game Saturday against West L.A.

Kamin said she based her decision partly on reports prepared by Pierce and Harbor, which each conducted internal investigations last week.

But Harbor Athletic Director Jim O’Brien questioned whether Kamin considered their findings seriously.

“The fact that bothers me the most is they didn’t hear our side at all,” O’Brien said. “They didn’t talk to any of us in the interview process. I’m just stunned at this decision. I thought we went through the proper procedure and did the right things along the way. But they just didn’t listen.”

O’Brien said he plans to determine what appeals are available to Harbor.

“I’ve tried to protect the Pierce coach and the people over there, and I’m not holding anything back now,” O’Brien said. “I can tell you that this whole thing started before the game.”

Harbor Coach Don Weems would not comment but announced Thursday the indefinite suspension of four Harbor players. Gary Wood, the school’s public information officer, said one unidentified player has been expelled from school, pending an appeal.

Kamin identified the suspended players as freshmen wide receivers Dion Mills and Jerry Harris, freshman defensive lineman Marcus Long and sophomore defensive lineman Marcus Richardson. Harris played at Granada Hills High. The others are from Carson High.

Mills, 19, has been charged with one felony count of assault with a deadly weapon for allegedly hitting Pierce assistant Pat Swift on the head with an aluminum crutch. He is free on $35,000 bail and will be arraigned Oct. 20 in San Pedro Municipal Court.

Pierce Coach Bill Norton said he is pleased with Kamin’s ruling. He had been upset Thursday when told that game officials had fingered one of his players for trash-talking during the game, which could have resulted in a one-game suspension. But Norton argued that the accused player did not play because of an injury.

“We could not come up with an individual (Pierce) player who should be suspended for a game,” Norton said. “The conference report confirms that.”

Norton said he has banned his players from trash-talking.

Despite Kamin’s ruling, one conference coach accused Pierce, and Norton in particular, of contributing to the fracas. Rob Hager, West L.A. coach, called Norton a “common thug” and said he wasn’t sure the Brahmas were blameless.

“I just wonder what could have prompted a guy to put a crutch over a coach’s head,” said Hager, who wasn’t at the game. “What must have been said for him to do that?”

Hager said he and some of his assistants had a confrontation with Norton and his staff while scouting the Harbor-Pierce game last year at Pierce. He said Norton, through one of his assistants, ordered Hager and his coaches off the sidelines and threatened them.

“They asked us to leave in a very threatening, confrontational nature,” Hager said. “I do not condone that type of barbaric behavior.”

Norton acknowledged one of his assistants heatedly told Hager and his people to leave the field, but only after making the request politely with no results.

“They were in our team area,” Norton said. “We sent someone over to ask them to leave and they chose to stay. Rob Hager has what is called selective memory. Some of his coaches were threatening my coaches during the game.”

During the brawl after the Sept. 25 game, Swift, an offensive line coach, was knocked unconscious by the blow from the crutch and spent three days at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center. He was listed in good condition Friday at Desert Hospital, where he was transferred to on Tuesday to be near his personal physician.

Norton suffered cuts and bruises, and Pierce running backs coach Phil Wijmer received a chest bruise.

Staff writer Mitch Polin contributed to this story.