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  • Wally

    Aug. 13, 2011 9:49 a.m. Wally SuperDork

    Robert "Sandy" Vietze got into a we bit of trouble when a pissed off father found him relieving himself on an 11 year old girl. It looks like his career has rally gone down hill.

    http://espn.go.com/olympics/skiing/story/_/id/6856362/us-skier-robert-sandy-vietze...

    NEW YORK -- A teen skier accused of getting drunk and then urinating in the cabin of a JetBlue flight was dismissed from the U.S. Ski Team's development squad.

    Robert "Sandy" Vietze, of Warren, Vt., was detained by police at John F. Kennedy International Airport on Wednesday morning after arriving on a red-eye flight from Portland, Ore.

    Police accused Vietze of urinating on a 12-year-old girl on the plane. But a lawyer for the girl's family later denied that account, saying he urinated on the floor next to her.

    Vietze, 18, faces a federal misdemeanor charge of indecent exposure, according to the U.S. attorney's office in Brooklyn.

    U.S. Ski and Snowboard Association executive vice president of athletics Luke Bodensteiner said in an email sent to The Associated Press on Friday: "Based on the information we have, Sandy Vietze is in violation of the USSA code of conduct and team agreement and has been dismissed from the team."

    The AP's attempts to reach Vietze and his parents for comment have been unsuccessful. The phone has been ringing unanswered at the family's home since Thursday, when the New York Post first reported the story.

    Vietze was nominated to the development team this spring after excelling as an alpine skier at the Green Mountain Valley School, a top ski academy and high school in Waitsfield, Vt., where tuition runs as much as $42,384 per year. He had been scheduled to compete on the national ski team's developmental squad for the 2011-12 season.

    A Port Authority Police Department detective wrote in court documents that Vietze told him he had consumed five or six beers and two rum and cola cocktails before boarding the flight. He said he passed out in his seat and awoke to find himself being yelled at by the father of a 12-year-old girl.

    According to the police account, the girl's father told the detective that when he returned from a trip to the bathroom at 2:30 a.m., he found Vietze urinating on his daughter. A lawyer for the girl's family, Robert Harris, contacted the AP on Friday evening and said the young man "did not urinate on their daughter, he urinated on the floor next to her seat."

    The Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, which runs area transit hubs, initially told the AP and other news outlets Thursday that federal prosecutors had decided to drop the indecent exposure charge, but a spokesman for the U.S. attorney's office, Robert Nardoza, said Friday that the case was pending.

    The charge carries a maximum fine of $1,000 and a possibility of up to a year in jail, although time behind bars would be very unusual in such a case.

    JetBlue Airways Corp. is based in New York.

  • JoeyM

    Aug. 13, 2011 11:06 a.m. JoeyM SuperDork

    Dave Chappelle - I want to pee on you

  • Aug. 13, 2011 12:38 p.m. Stealthtercel HalfDork

    I never went to journalism school, so could somebody please explain what in the name of Walter Cronkite is the point of telling me in the last line of that story that JetBlue Airways Corp. is based in New York? Who gives a flying Wartburg where their head office is? How does this help the reader understand what happened?

  • EastCoastMojo

    Aug. 13, 2011 12:54 p.m. EastCoastMojo SuperDork

    Gee. Whiz.

  • Toyman01

    Aug. 13, 2011 1:58 p.m. Toyman01 SuperDork

    EastCoastMojo wrote:

    Gee. Whiz.

    I see what you did there.

  • carguy123

    Aug. 13, 2011 4:09 p.m. carguy123 SuperDork

    Here are some key elements to this story as I see it (direct from the article.

    A teen skier . . . had consumed five or six beers and two rum and cola cocktails before boarding the flight.

    Now am I the only one to see anything wrong with those facts?

  • oldtin

    Aug. 13, 2011 4:33 p.m. oldtin Dork

    If it's true on the black out, that wouldn't have been his first time out and about with a few drinks. $43,000 for tuition for him, parents must be proud.

  • mad_machine

    Aug. 13, 2011 5:03 p.m. mad_machine SuperDork

    I was thinking how proud his parents must be too... I would not want to go home to them after that

  • carguy123

    Aug. 13, 2011 5:12 p.m. carguy123 SuperDork

    oldtin wrote:

    If it's true on the black out, that wouldn't have been his first time out and about with a few drinks.

    And therein is the problem.

  • sachilles

    Aug. 15, 2011 9:33 a.m. sachilles Dork

    Yep, dude is from my town. Making us proud . Went to the local ski academy.

  • cardiacdog

    Aug. 15, 2011 11:15 a.m. cardiacdog Reader

    Who was serving the 18 yo beer and rum before the flight? Someone's going to get fired for that part of this story.

  • oldtin

    Aug. 15, 2011 11:21 a.m. oldtin Dork

    sachilles wrote:

    Yep, dude is from my town. Making us proud . Went to the local ski academy.

    Just curious, wealthy family or putting it on the line for the kid?

  • sachilles

    Aug. 15, 2011 11:35 a.m. sachilles Dork

    Probably some where in the middle. The school does have a wide variety of folks from different economic backgrounds.

  • turboswede

    Aug. 15, 2011 3:43 p.m. turboswede SuperDork

    Drinks were probably prepared and consumed at a friend's place before heading to the airport. By the time he was on the plane the alcohol had taken full effect and he was completely blotto.

    Basically, he was an idiot, like so many other kids at that age. He just got caught being stupid in a a very public way.....

    There will certainly be repercussions for this guy and whomever provided the alcohol.

 
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