6 Questions Matt Wells and Kirby Hocutt Need to Answer About Utah State Allegations

After a DailyBeast.com article connected Matt Wells by name to a Utah State linebacker's multiple rape convictions this week, there's been a buzz to figure out what exactly happened that allowed Torrey Green, the Utah State player, to remain on the team through multiple crimes that he's now been convicted of committing.

The Daily Beast article linked above says this about Green meeting with Matt Wells:

In January 2016, Matt Wells, the head coach of the football team, allegedly documented a meeting with Green to discuss the allegations. After that conversation, Green was “permitted to remain a student at Utah State and to finish his football career, playing in all 13 games his senior season” and graduated in May after signing an NFL contract. He was never disciplined or removed from campus, according to the lawsuit.

The problem with this accusation is that Torrey Green didn't play another game after January 2016. He had moved on and attended training camp with the Atlanta Falcons until his past caught up with him.

That past started with this Salt Lake Tribune article from July 2016 that alleged four separate women accused him of sexual assault. Nothing happened to Green beyond a few interviews with police. Zero charges were filed.

In the article from the Salt Lake Tribune, three of the four victims were Utah State students and told someone on campus about their experiences. All four happened in 2015. It's unclear if the reports ever got to Matt Wells, but Title IX and Utah State were informed of the three student assaults.

After the initial report, there's a follow-up from the paper on October 9th, 2016 that Green had been charged with four counts of rape in five alleged attacks by the Cache County Attorney's Office. The charges were filed after they investigated nine separate allegations.

After the initial Salt Lake Tribune article, Wells responded to the news of the allegations by saying, "what you know is what I know," to Cavache Valley Daily. "I don’t know much more. They were all news to me very, very recently."

Obviously, this is troubling, especially in light of the alleged meeting between Wells and Green in January 2016, seven months prior to the July Salt Lake Tribune story that detailed the first four allegations.

Fast forward to November 2019, and Torrey Green has been convicted and sentenced to 26 years in prison for the allegations outlined earlier, plus a pending case moving to court soon. The case had been in court since the beginning of January when the Salt Lake Tribune covered testimony.

For reference, Wells was hired by Texas Tech University to take over its football program on November 29th, 2018 -- a full two years after Green was charged with sexual assault charges stemming from his time as one of Wells' players. This also means that Wells was employed by Utah State for an entire season and a half after Green was formally charged.

The reason Matt Wells' name is important now, after all this time, is because Utah State is currently being sued for their failures during the time when Green was actively raping Utah State students. The lawsuits allege that "at no point did Utah State actively investigate Green and the accusations made against him."

This is reported in an article about the lawsuit, "Though a football coach confronted Green concerning an allegation of rape made by one of the women in 2016, the school did not investigate further, she contends. The university failed to establish clear procedures and train employees on how to determine whether an investigation should move forward, according to the lawsuit."

Since the Daily Beast article was published, Matt Wells has made the following statement:

All of that being said, here are 6 questions Matt Wells and Kirby Hocutt need to answer:

1. When did Matt Wells first hear about the allegations?
2. What did Matt Wells uncover in the alleged January meeting with Green?
3. If Green told Wells about the allegations in January of 2016, why did he say, "What you know is what I know, I don't know much more. They [the allegations] were all news to me very, very recently" in August 2016?
4. When Kirby Hocutt vetted Matt Wells, how much did he uncover about this situation?
5. What did Matt Wells tell Kirby Hocutt during the interview process about the situation?
6. Is Matt Wells named in the lawsuits the victims have filed against Utah State?