Montclair Prep to Appeal Ban From Playoffs at State Level : Jurisprudence: Decision comes in wake of Southern Section ruling that Mounties committed two violations.

Undaunted by a Southern Section ruling that upheld a ban of Montclair Prep from the playoffs for the 1991-92 school year, the school plans to appeal the decision at the state level. The appeal will be filed with the California Interscholastic Federation’s state office in La Mirada, perhaps as early as today, according to Dan Grigsby, Montclair Prep’s attorney.

The Southern Section’s executive committee ruled Monday that Montclair Prep did not report the use of an ineligible player in 1985 and that Montclair Prep used its status as a boarding school to illegally recruit athletes. As a result, a postseason ban put in place last fall was upheld by a 10-0 vote.

Montclair Prep was cleared of two other charges addressed in the hearing. The tally on one charge, regarding Principal V.E. (Doc) Simpson’s alleged changing of grades to allow athletes to remain eligible, ended in a 5-5 deadlock.

Another charge, which centered on the enrollment of a Banning High football player in a Montclair Prep summer school course, was dismissed without a vote when the committee agreed that section rules technically had not been violated.

“We walked in with four charges and two of them were basically dismissed,” said John Hazelton, an assistant football coach at Montclair Prep who attended the hearing. “Who knows? At the state level we may get more (charges) dismissed.”

Simpson could not be reached for comment Tuesday. Grigsby said that when he filed an appeal with the state earlier this year regarding another Montclair Prep matter, officials informed him that they were prepared to quickly convene a panel to address the matter. State representatives were unavailable for comment.

A lengthy appeal process would hurt the school’s chances of regaining postseason berths. The all-inclusive boys’ basketball playoffs will begin March 21.

According to Hazelton, a group of Montclair Prep parents might seek a temporary restraining order that would allow the Mounties’ winter sports teams to compete in the playoffs until the appeal is addressed at the state level.

The hearing brought to a close, at the section level at least, several years of investigation and testimony. Those on the executive committee, in fact, were handed an inch-thick, spiral-bound summary of the Montclair Prep investigation as they entered the room to begin the hearing.

Although a vote on the charges of grade tampering ended in a tie, testimony on the matter was spirited, particularly when the section produced a witness who made several startling accusations.

Richard Godoy Jr., a 1987 Montclair Prep graduate who characterized his association with Simpson during his school years as a “friendship,” stated to the committee that he had on numerous occasions seen Simpson change grades without the knowledge of teachers.

“If a student was upset with his or her grade . . . (Simpson would) get on the computer, call up their file and change the grade,” said Godoy, who claimed that he routinely spent his lunch break in Simpson’s office. “I never saw him decline a grade change.”

Asked by the committee whether he had changed the grade of an athlete without a substantial academic reason, Simpson replied, “No, I have not.”

Said Godoy: “If there was a request for a change, he made the change. If somebody said, ‘The teacher doesn’t like me,’ he made the change. If they said, ‘My parents will scream,’ he made the change.”

Grigsby introduced evidence that showed that Godoy’s father, Richard Godoy Sr., had entered into a business arrangement with Simpson. Montclair Prep assumed ownership of a parcel of land that Godoy Sr. surrendered because he could not make his son’s tuition payments. Godoy Sr. later asked Simpson to relinquish the land, but a deal could not be worked out.

According to Simpson, an angry Godoy Sr. then stated that his son soon would call the section office to report athletic and grading irregularities he had witnessed.

After making a statement to the section on the grade-change matter in February, 1991, Godoy Jr. said he was contacted by Simpson, who unsuccessfully lobbied Godoy to recant his statement. Godoy said he declined and testified that Simpson became angry and called him “a dirty snake and other vulgar names.”

The committee declined to vote on an alleged impropriety involving Banning football player Jagade Freeman. Freeman enrolled at Montclair Prep for summer school in 1987 and was given a grade of B in a geometry course. Freeman paid no tuition for the class.

Freeman twice had failed the course and was steered to Montclair Prep by Hazelton, who was the Banning coach at the time. Freeman reportedly completed the individual study curriculum under the guidance of a Banning assistant, who was paid by Montclair Prep, and became eligible to play in the fall.