Dispatches from SEC Country

Greg Poole of the Leather Helmet Blog has an update on the Cam Newton investigation in which he suggests Auburn's national championship may give way to the NCAA Death Penalty:

Colonial Bank based in Birmingham, AL failed in August of 2009. The chairman of Colonial was Bobby Lowder who is also on the Auburn board of trustees. It is widely held that Lowder is the puppet master of Auburn's BOT and is the man who had Bill Muse removed as AD. Lowder is also the man who interviewed Bobby Petrino while T-Tubs was still under contract.


In 2009 the FDIC seized Colonial and sold its assets to BB&T, and began an investigation into all of Colonial's operations. It is believed that in the course of this investigation the FBI has found overwhelming proof of Auburn supplying the parents of football players with loans of which they were not required to pay back. It was also learned that Colonial bank had set up special accounts that were linked to ATM cards that were then issued to Auburn players giving them access to funds provided by boosters.


It is expected that in the next few weeks the Justice Department will hand down indictments on Lowder and a number of Colonial executives over the TARP fraud. Now here is Auburn's problem. If the indictment specifies about the loans and the ATM linked accounts the NCAA will have no choice but to launch a full scale investigation. These actions, if true, dwarf the Alabama scandal of the 2000's that left Bama one vote shy of the Death Penalty.


Poole also passes along "A Cam Newton Investigation Timeline" from the website I Bleed Crimson Red.   It should be noted, neither of these sites are objective sources.  But both do a comprehensive job of exposing the laundry the Tiger fans would like to kick under the bed.  By now their entire house is infused with the ripe, moldy smell of a dirty wife beater smeared in barbeque sauce and spilled corn whiskey.

Some of the the details are verifiable and undeniable, and horribly inconvenient for the War Eagle crowd:
June 9, 2009


Colonial Bank is served with a cease and desist order.


Cecil Newton, father of then Blinn (Junior) College Quarterback, Cameron Newton, and Pastor/Bishop of the Holy Zion Church of Deliverance, is told by Newnan Georgia code enforcement officials that he must make a series of costly repairs to his church or it will be demolished.


August 14, 2009


Colonial Bank is seized by state regulators and placed in receivership with the FDIC, throwing the banks’ books open to forensic accountants and investigators.


September 2009


Newton returns to the Newnan City Council and says that the church can meet code in “six months.”

City Council reporter for the Times-Herald, Elizabeth Melville, said Cam Newton's father told the council that another son was signing to a football team and was giving the church some money from the deal. "He said he had a different son that played football that was being signed on that expected to get a lot of money from a deal. He was going to be able to give him some and I think he was going to get some from somewhere else. I think he was going to get some from somewhere else. He explained the origins of where the money would come from at a council meeting and no one was suspicious at the time."


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Duck Tracks:  At this point, none of this means anything for the 2011 Ducks.  If Auburn is forced to vacate the trophy, it won't be awarded to Oregon and it shouldn't.  The best response Oregon fans and the Oregon program can make to whole mess is focus on earning another trip to the championship, and proving that one loss does not define them.

Auburn won and Auburn cheated.  That fast, entertaining team from the Northwest can get the country's attention back on football by making a strong commitment to a new vision.