Hello Joey C.
Thank you so much for effort you make sharing the Cape Ann experience with your followers in Good Morning Gloucester.
I did enjoy your write up. But I wanted to forward the real reason I made the decision to turn off scoring.
Attached below is a company wide memo I sent my staff a week ago. Also included is an article I reference to support my decision. Over the past month and a half, we have seen a rise in problems with parents…… not the players. The scores make the parents crazy….not the kids.
Please take the time to look at the article attached and please, please, please feel free to call me if you have any questions. If you have a problem pulling up the attached article…..google Thomas Junta.
Best regards and intentions,
Kelly Cragg
Danvers Indoor Sports
And not every body gets a trophy at DIS ; )
Subject: Cabin Fever Season – Company wide Memo
Memo 2/17/17
To: Staff
Hello Everyone,
Some of you are already aware that I reference the time from January one to March 31 as “Cabin Fever Season. The term can be humorous in nature but I take it very serious. It is not documented but this time line window is what i consider problematic. Over the years, I have seen a rise in emotional instability in all aspects of our business. Whether it is Players, Coaches and even worse parents, it is notable to project that situations can escalate where our customers are not using filters they usually have to contain the simplest rise in emotions.
I attached a news story that some of you may remember. It is a world we live in everyday. I ask you to read it thoroughly to understand how easy it could be that we, can find ourselves in this situation.
I depend on all of you to be the ground forces to see these situations and diffuse them accordingly. I am always close by either in person or phone to assist you. Josh is here for you as well. We have seen it and have dealt with these situations in the past and would be quick to assist you.
Starting today, any league games other than basketball, that we regulate will be scoreless for one week. I will be turning off the scoring features on the scoreboards from 2/17/17 through and including 2/24/17 as a reminder to everyone, that we are conscious of potential spikes in emotions.
If anyone asks, Your DIS response or something similar to this can be; “No, the clocks are not broken. We are recognizing that this is game and respectfully ask all of our patrons to understand that is only a game.” Believe me, this will not be sufficient for a good portion of those whom inquire. This decision will strike a cord with the people that may have lost sight of what they are doing here. You will even get negative discourse back. You will even hear grumblings of people upset with the fact that we shut off the scoring.
This is the intent. Bring out the elephant in the room and go after it.
The referees will still be able to keep time but discourage to not use the scores. Any referee, not adhereing to the week long process will be talked to. Referees are to report win and losses as normal, with actual scores.
Enjoy the attached read. It is a reminder of how bad things can turn worse.
Kelly
From the New York Times-
Father in Killing at Hockey Rink Is Given Sentence of 6 to 10 Years
By FOX BUTTERFIELDJAN. 26, 2002
Thomas Junta, who beat another father to death after an argument at a practice hockey game, was sentenced to 6 to 10 years in prison today, double the state’s guidelines for his crime, involuntary manslaughter.
Judge Charles Grabau of Middlesex County Superior Court accepted the prosecutor’s sentencing request, calling it ”lenient and most generous” given the circumstances of the killing. The judge said he had even ”contemplated exceeding the commonwealth’s recommendations.”
The reason for the longer sentence, Judge Grabau said, was that he found ”aggravating factors” in the killing. In particular, the judge said, the fatal beating took place at a youth hockey game and the sons of both Mr. Junta and the victim, Michael Costin, witnessed it.
But, presumably addressing the millions of Americans who watched the trial on Court TV and CNN, Judge Grabau said, ”My sentence is not meant to send a message to anyone in the outside world” about parental rage in youth sports.
Thomas Orlandi Jr., Mr. Junta’s lawyer, called the sentence extreme and said he had already filed an appeal. Mr. Orlandi had sought a suspended sentence with community service for Mr. Junta, 44. The lawyer insisted at the sentencing hearing, as he had throughout the trial, that Mr. Junta had acted in self-defense.
Mr. Junta maintained his composure while two of Mr. Costin’s sons, addressing the court as victims, described how much they missed their father, who cared for them as a single parent. But Mr. Junta dropped his head in his hands and began to weep when Mr. Orlandi read letters by his own son and daughter asking Judge Grabau to release him on probation so he could help care for them.
In his address, Brendan Costin, 14, the oldest of Mr. Costin’s four children, recalled the hockey game as ”just an average day at the skating rink,” he said, until a stranger began attacking his father, sending blood rushing down his face and causing him to lose consciousness.
”I realized I had just witnessed my dad literally being beaten to death,” Brendan said.
Mr. Costin’s sister, Mary Barbuzzi, said she considered the sentence fair. ”We believe justice has been served,” Ms. Barbuzzi said. ”Our prayers will be with the Junta family, and our family will try to move beyond this tragedy.”
Under state law, Mr. Junta must serve at least the minimum sentence, six, though he could receive a few months off for good behavior. Mr. Junta, a 270-pound truck driver who outweighed Mr. Costin by more than 100 pounds, will be sent to the state prison in Walpole.
After the judge rendered his sentence, Mr. Junta’s 11 brothers and sisters pushed their way out of the court; some cursed at reporters.
”I am shocked,” John Junta, a brother, said. ”I was hoping for probation. But I thought at least he would get state guidelines.”
Mr. Orlandi said a major ground for appeal would be that Judge Grabau refused to let him introduce evidence that Mr. Costin had psychiatric troubles and a lengthy record of convictions for petty crimes. Mr. Orlandi said that evidence would have shown that Mr. Costin, not Mr. Junta, had been the likely aggressor.
Mr. Orlandi tried again to introduce this evidence in the sentencing hearing by reading letters from Mr. Junta’s two children and a friend who alluded to Mr. Costin’s troubles. But Judge Grabau said he was ”disturbed by the disingenuous introduction of Mr. Costin’s character.”
”This is an attempt to shift the focus to the victim as culprit,” Judge Grabau said.
As a retort, Judge Grabau told the packed court room and the national television audience that the beating at the hockey rink on July 5, 2000, in Reading, north of Boston, was not the first time Mr. Junta had used his fists in front of his children. In 1991, Judge Grabau said, Mr. Junta had repeatedly struck his wife while their children watched, at a wedding. His wife took out a restraining order, but she never pressed charges and continued to live with him.
The fatal fight began when Mr. Junta said he saw a team of young players, including Mr. Costin’s three sons, using overly aggressive play against a team on which his son, Quinlan Junta, then 10, was playing. Mr. Junta argued with Mr. Costin about it, and later the two men scuffled just off the ice until Mr. Junta was told to leave the arena. But he soon came back, so enraged that he pushed aside the assistant rink manager, Nancy Blanchard, leaving a large bruise on her arm, Judge Grabau recalled today.
The two men soon encountered each other again, with Mr. Junta ending up atop Mr. Costin, punching him in the head and neck so hard that he severed an artery at the base of Mr. Costin’s brain.
Massachusetts sentencing guidelines recommend a sentence of 3 to 5 years for a first-time offender for involuntary manslaughter. In imposing the stiffer sentence, Judge Grabau came close to what the guidelines recommend for a first-time offender found guilty of voluntary manslaughter — 8 to 12 years.
In his victim’s address, another son of Mr. Costin, Michael, now 13, spoke of learning of his father’s death from a doctor.
”Right there, I knew my life would never be the same,” Michael said. ”My life hasn’t been the same. My dad isn’t there in the morning to wake me up. He isn’t there when we play sports.”
”Your honor,” Michael said, ”No matter how much of a sentence that you give Thomas Junta, my dad got more. My dad will never be back to me and my family.”
Good Morning Gloucester 