Article published Thursday, August 7, 2008
Villegas' guardian told player to "tell the truth"
By MAUREEN FULTON
BLADE SPORTS WRITER
The legal guardian for former University of Toledo basketball player Sammy Villegas when he came to Ohio as a teenager, Richard Warren, said he told Villegas in recent months to "tell the truth and cooperate" when Villegas told him he had spoken with authorities regarding point-shaving allegations.
Villegas, a native of Puerto Rico, was charged by federal authorities in Detroit in June for accepting bribes for point shaving. Warren, a common pleas court judge in Allen County, said he has not spoken to Villegas since the charges were made public Wednesday but he believes he is currently in the Dominican Republic playing professional basketball.
Warren has talked to Villegas several times since he graduated from the University of Toledo in 2006. He said of Villegas, "Sammy is so free-spirited, loving, innocent. That's the way he's always been." |