Floyd plans new Snyder inquiry
Published Feb. 21, 2006
Quin Snyder is gone, but the story of his departure lingers on.
On Monday, UM system President Elson Floyd said he ordered another look at the circumstances surrounding the former men's basketball coach's resignation — this time by a former federal prosecutor and a newspaper publisher.
In a memo to the curators that was released publicly Monday afternoon, Floyd announced he has asked Jean Paul Bradshaw, the former U.S. attorney for Missouri's western district, and Dalton Wright, the publisher of the Lebanon Daily Record, to investigate Snyder's departure. Wright is also the former president of the Missouri Press Association and the National Newspaper Association.
"Chancellor Brady Deaton and I both agree that final closure must be reached surrounding the decision made by Quin Snyder to step down as the MU men's basketball coach," Floyd wrote in the memo. "Thus I have asked two distinguished Missourians to undertake a thorough and complete review."
UM system spokesman Joe Moore said Floyd would not comment on the investigation until it is completed.
Bradshaw said Floyd asked the investigators to take on a "broad range of responsibilities."
"He's basically asking us to look at the circumstances around coach Snyder's resignation," Bradshaw said. "We want to know who talked to whom and what they said. So it's pretty broad what we have to look at."
Bradshaw said Floyd asked him to begin the investigation as quickly as possible, and Wright said the inquiry could start as early as this week.
"We would like to start as soon as Bradshaw and I get together," Wright said. "We'd like to get the investigation started during the next four or five days, but that's largely depending on each other's schedule and the schedules of those we'd like to interview."
Bradshaw said his background as a prosecutor and as a private attorney has prepared him for the assignment.
"My background is in conducting a lot of internal investigations.," Bradshaw said. "I was a former federal prosecutor. I help a lot of companies with their own internal investigations."
Although both Bradshaw and Wright are MU graduates, résumés included with Floyd's memo show no professional affiliation with the university. Bradshaw was president of the MU Law School Alumni Association from 1990 to 1991.
"I have no views," Bradshaw said. "Whenever starting an investigation, you have to come in with no preconceived notions of what has happened."
Wright said he would "try to go in looking at the story as objectively as possible."
Floyd announced the investigation days after several members of the Board of Curators publicly questioned the results of an investigation conducted by Deaton.
Deaton released a statement Thursday afternoon about the results of his investigation, which Floyd ordered earlier last week. In the statement, Deaton placed no blame for the resignation and said he was concerned MU's image had suffered because of the way the circumstances of the resignation were communicated to the public.
Deaton released a statement about Floyd's decision to launch another investigation on Monday afternoon.
"Two very distinguished individuals from outside the university have agreed to undertake an additional review of the situation," Deaton said in the statement. "I did complete an extensive verbal report to the president and am ready to assist this review in any way possible. I feel comfortable that Mr. Bradshaw and Mr. Dalton will serve the university well."