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EXCLUSIVE: Former San Jose State Assistant Women’s volleyball coach Melissa Batie-Smoose knew she would sue as soon as she found out she was suspended last season.
She had just submitted a title IX complaint that included several accusations against the school and the transient player Blaire Fleming. The suspension hit her the first weekend of November 2024, just days before the presidential election. She found out minutes before warming up for a home game against New Mexico State.
“I go into the gym and I was removed by an administrator and told me that I was not allowed to have contact with my players, nor the three-foot back on campus. They would have the keys and handed me paper and said that everything you need to know is in there,” Batie-Smoose told Pakinomist Digital.
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She claims she had personal items on campus that she was not allowed to return to retrieve, and alleged that she was never explicitly told which of her actions she was punished for, but simply that she violated Ferpa (law of education rights and privacy) laws.
Last week, she brought a lawsuit against the California State University (CSU) board of directors as SJSU is one of 23 California -based schools that are part of the system. Batie-Smoose and her lawyer Vernadette Brolyes believe the suspension was “retaliation” to her title IX complaint over Fleming.
“We feel confident that there is a retaliatory aspect for their actions,” Brolyes said.
In the title IX complaint, Batie-Smoosis claimed that Fleming conspired with an opposite player to get co-captain Brooke slushes connected to the face during a 3rd October match.
The alleged incident took place while SJSU was under a national media microscope for a growing controversy involving Fleming. Several opponents had lost games to the Spartans after Co-captain Brooke Slusser joined a lawsuit against NCAA with reference to her experience with Fleming.
Slusses claimed that the school withheld the knowledge that Fleming was a man, all while the coaches paired her with Fleming in hotel rooms to raise at Fleming’s request. Slusser former Pakinomist Digital told that Coaches only consulted with Fleming about preferred roommates, but none of the female players and that Fleming often chose slusses.
Batie smoose confirmed this to Pakinomist Digital.
“Blaire would accommodate with Brooke Slusses, and that’s what Blaire felt comfortable, so blaire gets it Blaire wants,” Batie-Smoose said.
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Associated head coach Melissa Batie-Smoosis with San Jose St. Spartans as they play Air Force in an NCAA woman’s volleyball match at Spartan Gym in San Jose, California, Thursday, October 31, 2024. (Santiago Mejia/San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images)
The coach also alleged SJSU catering to Fleming with other special exceptions that were not awarded to female athletes.
“Not to show up to practice without excuses, sit in the stands and ate while practicing, that kind of thing,” Melissa said of the special exceptions reserved solely for Fleming.
Batie-Smoose said she was also not made aware that Fleming was a man until she accepted the job at SJSU. The coach moved all her family all the way from Connecticut to take the job all while she thought she would only coach female players.
She claims she was not officially told the truth about Fleming until she began to ask about it, and head coach Todd Kress eventually told her, a few weeks into her tenure. She claims she was then told she couldn’t tell other players or players’ parents about it.
“Todd Kress told me in passing … Because I asked … ‘Oh, by the way, Blaire is a man,'” Batie-Smoose said, adding that she was threatened that she would be fired if she told other athletes or parents.
“Both Todd Kress and the administration, Laura Alexandra, were not allowed to talk about it, allow parents to know it or someone to know.”
Batie-Smoosis had no experience of coaching a transgender athlete, saying she ‘never spoke to blaire,’ Batie-Smoose says she preferred to focus on coaching and protection of the female athletes.
“I knew it from the day I saw Blaire playing, but for me it was a focus on the female athletes, that’s really why I knew I was here, I had a purpose beyond coaching, which was to protect the female athletes for their privacy, security and well -being, so it was always exclusively my focus, but not on blaire,” she said.
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BROOKE Slusser and Blaire Fleming of San Jose State Spartans calls a spectacle under the first set against Air Force Falcons at Falcon Court at East Gym on October 19, 2024 in Colorado Springs, Colorado. (Andrew WeVers/Getty Images)
Still, she adhered to the instructions not to tell others about Fleming for years after she arrived at university. She says it began to affect her physically and mentally.
“[I was] Not allowed to talk to Brooke slushes about something or any of the other athletes or recruiting, ”Batie-Smoose said.
“The stress knows that I lie to parents and everyone, and it was against everything I believe in, I had to do a lot of prayer and a lot of meditation to know that I was staying in this room and how long I can stay there to protect the females, it’s my job right now.”
Her time to finally speak up for defense of the female athletes came last November when the controversy became a high -profile election season talking point. The team had already seen four conference games wiped out its schedule, and the police protection had been awarded to the team a national attention became more frequent.
Batie smoosis said the decisive factor that finally came up with the complaint was the request of several female players on the team. So, in the last week of October, Batie-Smoose submitted the complaint and brought over the allegations of Fleming, who consumed with an opponent to get slots injured.
The alleged incident took place the night before October 3 -Fight against Colorado State as Fleming and two other teammates allegedly met with Colorado State star Malaya Jones to discuss the plan to spike the ball at Slusser’s head during the game.
Batie-Smoose and other players were reportedly later made aware of the alleged incident when the other SJSU players who allegedly were there with Fleming allegedly came forward to tell teammates about what Pakinomist Digital reported previously reported after reviewing several court documents.
The complaint prompted the Mountain West conference to investigate the allegations.
Mountain West announced that the investigation was closed without finding “sufficient evidence” and that no discipline was “necessary” in a November 15th obtained by Pakinomist Digital. This letter and E -Mail -coordination of interviews for the investigation obtained by Pakinomist Digital repeatedly said the game took place on October 2nd.
On November 15 -Letter, which announced that the investigation was closed without sufficient evidence, was also sent only three days after the first e emails to create interviews with witnesses were sent.
Pakinomist Digital later reported The fact that the law firm hired to conduct the investigation, Willkie Farr & Gallagher (WFG), is the same company representing Mountain West against another trial filed by slushes that included the same accusations against Fleming of Conspiring for getting sluts injured as seen in public records obtained by FOX News Digital.
Batie-Smoosis and Brolyes say they plan to bring this up to court under arguments.
“It’s a clear conflict of interest and a compromise with their objectivity,” Brolyes said. “It is certainly something that at an appropriate time we would bring attention from the invoice.”
Brolyes added that they are now seeking compensatory damage, reinstatement and refund, penalties, attorney fees and injunctions that female athletes will not be forced or compete with or against trans athletes.
“These are things in the trial that we think she is legitimately entitled to,” Brolyes said.
Batie-Smoose’s contract with SJSU expired the last day of the last January and it was not renewed. Two weeks after this, police confirmed that her house was shot and vandalized with a pellet gun. She thought the crime was committed against her by someone who disagreed with her decision to speak at SJSU. The police did not determine a motive.
The volleyball coach has since left California and moved to Texas. She tries to continue her coaching career, but has encountered difficulties in landing another job. She believes that the reputation she had to take up because of the situation she was in at SJSU is the reason.
“I’ve been a very successful coach and I’ve been coaching for a long time and I don’t even get anything to look at coaching jobs,” she said.
SJSU and CSU refused to respond to Batie-Smoose’s statements when they reached Pakinomist Digital.
Pakinomist Digital has tried to contact Fleming via social media.
