Hung Jury Ends Trial of SDSU Football Player in Fight With Gymnast

The trial of Michael Damien Wilder, a San Diego State University football player accused of battery against gymnast Kurt Thomas, resulted in a hung jury Thursday. Wilder, 22, was acquitted on a second charge of battery against Keith Campbell, a gymnast in Thomas’ touring company.

Thomas and Campbell were in San Diego in January to watch a national cheerleading championship, and they clashed with Wilder in a men’s room at Confetti nightclub in Mission Valley. The gymnasts testified that Wilder started the fight by arguing with Campbell in the rest room and punched Thomas in the cheek without warning. Thomas said the wound required 16 stitches and forced cancellation of his two television appearances the next morning.

Wilder said Campbell sparked the fight by barring his exit from the rest room and starting a shouting match. Thomas then punched Wilder glancingly in the neck and grabbed him around the waist, Wilder testified.

The jury split, 9-3, in favor of acquitting Wilder of beating Thomas.

“The story given by Kurt Thomas and his friend had too many discrepancies for the jury to believe it,” said Pierre Pfeffer, Wilder’s attorney. “We’re disappointed that we didn’t get another acquittal.”

Wilder, a senior and safety for the SDSU Aztecs, said that the trial had cut into his workout time but that it had not jeopardized his playing status. “I was pleased, obviously, with the Keith Campbell verdict and a little disappointed with the Kurt Thomas hung jury decision,” Wilder said. “I think our case perfectly showed what happened. I was disappointed the jury couldn’t come to a verdict.

“I am possibly going to have to go through this again.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Albert Arena said, “A hung jury was the best that could have been expected.”

No independent witnesses testified to show that either Wilder provoked the fight or acted in self-defense, and jurors could not agree beyond a reasonable doubt in the Thomas case that Wilder willfully used force. “Batteries are pretty hard to prove when it’s the defendant’s word against the victim’s,” said Arena. “I don’t fault the jury at all. Beyond a reasonable doubt is a tough mountain to climb.”

Thomas, speaking by phone from his office in Scottsdale, Ariz., was disappointed with the hung jury. “It makes me feel weird about our justice system,” said Thomas, 30. “The bottom line is it’s really disappointing for me. My real goal in this thing was to make him realize that he couldn’t go around hitting people and throwing his weight around.”

Thomas said he will file a civil suit against Confetti and another against Wilder for the medical costs and embarrassment from the incident.

Pfeffer said the fight should not have evolved into a criminal case. “It more properly is left as a civil matter,” he said. “It just doesn’t rise to the dignity of a criminal case.”

However, Arena said he would recommend that the Wilder case be retried next month. “I think there’s enough to convict him,” Arena said.

Thomas, inventor of the Thomas Flair maneuver on the pommel horse, placed second in the world gymnastics championships in 1979 and was denied an Olympic performance by the 1980 U.S. boycott of the Games. His company performed at Sea World in 1984 and 1985.