Security Official Says IOC Was Spoiled Rotten in Atlanta

George Mitchell is right: The culture of gift-giving and special favor that permeates the Olympic site-selection process is a mess in need of immediate custodial care. The bigger the broom the better.

But what about what happens after the bid has been won and the Games are underway and the International Olympic Committee is in town, rolling up its sleeves for three weeks of wining, dining and free tickets to swimming, gymnastics and track and field?

That is a house also in need of a full steam-cleaning, according to a former Los Angeles police officer who helped coordinate security for the 1996 Summer Games in Atlanta.

“A lot of us began to see some real cracks when the Olympic Committee came into Atlanta,” says Dennis Loeb, who helped organize transportation for IOC members during the ’96 Games. “[President Juan Antonio] Samaranch was treated like a king. He was absolutely treated like royalty. . . .

“Every time [the IOC] had a meeting, their security was provided by the Atlanta Police Department. Samaranch always had a Georgia state policeman driving him every time he came into town. Every IOC member, every one of them, had their own driver, their own car.

“I was in charge of aviation. I had 22 helicopters and three of them--multimillion-dollar helicopters--were budgeted for ‘executive transportation,’ as well as two Cessna Citations to provide transportation for IOC members back and forth across the United States. I can’t tell you how many millions of dollars that cost.”

Loeb says members of the security force received a “protocol packet” from the Atlanta organizing committee before the Games with express instructions as to the proper way one was to address Samaranch during his visit.

“We were instructed that Samaranch would be known as ‘Your Excellency,’ ” Loeb says. “For me, it was worse than dealing with the pope.

“If we talked to him, it was ‘Your Excellency.’ I rebelled at that. Give me a break--the guy puts his pants on like everybody else. I don’t even think the president of the United States should be called ‘Your Excellency.’ Here I was, providing him with a helicopter and having to pick him up--and I was supposed to call him ‘Your Excellency’ too?” Loeb claims he never did.

“ ‘Mr. Samaranch’ was close enough,” he says.

Loeb met Samaranch several times during the summer of ’96. He describes Samaranch as “a pompous individual. I had nothing good to say about him. Or [IOC Vice President Dick] Pound or any of the rest of them. Every one of them acted exactly as if they were royalty.

“They were catered to by law enforcement, they were catered to by security. Every one of them had volunteers--a flock of volunteers that were with them 24 hours a day. At one point in time, one of the IOC members, Mr. [Ashwini] Kumar of India, had no batteries for his hearing aid, so I ended up going to [a store] to get batteries for his hearing aid. Things like that.

“Anything they wanted, we would pick up for them.”

According to Loeb, “the frosting on the cake was when Dick Pound’s wife got into an altercation with a police officer and the lengths the Olympic Committee as well as the city of Atlanta went to circumvent the law, to get the charges [reduced].”

Julie Pound was arrested during the Games after scuffling with a police officer who was directing traffic. According to the police report, Pound was trying to cross the street when the officer, Leanne Browning, ordered her back onto the curb. When Pound refused, words were exchanged, Browning grabbed Pound by the arm and, according to the report, the woman kneed Browning in the groin. Julie Pound was initially charged with refusing to comply with an officer’s orders, obstruction, disorderly conduct and simple battery. Three months after the arrest, Pound pleaded guilty to lesser counts of failing to comply with traffic instructions and disorderly conduct and fined $2,000.

“A lot of strings were pulled,” Loeb says. “Everything was kind of pushed under the table as soon as they found out who she was.”

Two-and-a-half years later, Loeb finds it intriguing to see Dick Pound in charge of the IOC’s in-house scandal investigation.

“This is an individual who helped get charges dropped down against his wife in a criminal action,” Loeb says. “Why not have Mrs. Clinton investigate Mr. Clinton? Pound took enough of the gratuities himself. He was treated like an absolute prince. The only thing missing were people blowing four-foot-long trumpets every time he came into the room.

“He had the drivers. He had the high-speed Mercedes. He had the 14 volunteers working on every part of his comfort. Why should he be the one doing the investigation?”

BUT DOES THE PUBLIC CARE?

Newspaper editors and Olympic corporate sponsors aside, the Olympic scandal is a story that has failed to resonate with most of America.

According to a Gallup Poll conducted last weekend, only 5% of respondents say they have been following the Olympic site-selection controversy very closely, with 65% either not following it closely or not following it at all.

Additionally, only 8% of respondents claimed the controversy has caused their respect for the Olympics to decline a lot, with 43% saying their respect has not declined at all.

In fact, interest in the Games themselves is up--with 65% saying they are interested or very interested in the Games, up from 61% in 1988.

Conclusions to be drawn: Let the IOC members have their bread. Circuses are what we want.

MITCHELL REPORT DISAPPOINTS

Today in Washington, the U.S. Olympic Committee issues its official response to the Mitchell Commission report, but already one former USOC official has turned his thumb down. “I think the Mitchell Commission report is disappointing,” says Michael Lenard, former USOC vice president from Los Angeles. “That is certainly not unexpected, but it is disappointing nonetheless.”

Lenard believes the report dealt too lightly with the USOC--none too surprising, in that the investigation was commissioned by the USOC.

“I’m disappointed in the scope,” Lenard says. “The president of the USOC [Bill Hybl] set forth a very restricted scope of inquiry for the Mitchell Commission. People within the USOC had attempted to have the scope expanded, but, unfortunately, we have seen it turn back into the original restricted scope dealing primarily with rules for selection committees in the future.

“They’re saying, ‘Don’t take gifts.’ All that does is tighten the screws a little bit, which, frankly, is not brain surgery. It doesn’t deal with the underlying problem, which is a culture of patronage and quid pro quo found within both the USOC and the IOC that created politics without government.”