Head coach Bill Belichick spoke to the media Thursday morning for the first time after new developments surfaced in the investigation into UNC football’s general manager, Michael Lombardi.<\/p>\n
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill has hired at least three outside lawyers to help with its investigation into Lombardi, who was placed on paid administrative leave last week.<\/p>\n
Lawyers Nate Huff<\/a> and McNair Nichols<\/a>, as of Wednesday, are handling the investigation inquiry work, Dean Stoyer, UNC\u2019s vice chancellor for communications, told WRAL. The pair were partners at K&L Gates, which handled a seven-month investigation into UNC\u2019s School of Civic Life and Leadership that concluded in late February.\u00a0<\/p>\n K&L Gates performed preliminary work on the Lombardi investigation, but all work is now being transferred to Barnes & Thornburg where Huff and Nichols now work. The lawyers have done other work for the university recently.<\/p>\n Wes Camden<\/a>, a partner with Williams Mullen, will advise the university on the investigation. Camden argued on behalf of the university in a hearing earlier this week over whether parts or all of the 400-plus page K&L Gates report produced as part of a $1.2-million investigation into the civics school should be released publicly<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe university is committed to conducting a comprehensive yet expedient review,\u201d Stoyer told WRAL in a statement.<\/p>\n He said no public funds would be used for the outside lawyers. The Office of University Counsel will lead the investigation, Stoyer said.<\/p>\n The Assembly first reported that UNC hired outside counsel.<\/p>\n Lombardi is a longtime associate of head football coach Bill Belichick. The two worked together in the NFL and on media projects during Belichick\u2019s one year out of the league. Lombardi reached out to UNC leaders to let them know of Belichick\u2019s genuine interest in coaching the Tar Heels. Lombardi was Belichick\u2019s first hire after being hired and is the highest-paid general manager in college football at $1.5 million<\/a>.<\/p>\n He was placed on paid administrative leave on July 27<\/a>, and UNC announced on July 30<\/a> that it was in the process of investigating, through its Office of University Counsel, \u201callegations that led to the personnel action regarding Michael Lombardi.\u201d<\/p>\n Lombardi\u2019s lawyer, Tom Mars, told WRAL on Wednesday evening that neither he nor Lombardi have been contacted by anyone involved in the investigation and that Lombardi welcomed \u201cthat he welcomed \u201cthe opportunity to clear his name.\u201d Last week, Mars said Lombardi wasn\u2019t aware of the nature of the investigation<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cNeither of us know anything more about the investigation,\u201d Mars said, then they did last week.<\/p>\n It is unclear if the investigation is contained to allegations involving Lombardi or if it is a more open-ended look at the football program and\/or athletic department.<\/p>\n The program could also face questioning by the College Sports Commission<\/a>, which is charged with enforcing rules around name, image and likeness agreements following a $3-billion legal settlement<\/a> between the NCAA, its major conferences and former athletes.<\/p>\n Belichick is scheduled to talk to media on Thursday at 8:30 a.m. for a regular update on fall camp.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Head coach Bill Belichick spoke to the media Thursday morning for the first time after new developments surfaced…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":804702,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[63],"tags":[7025,349,99,26977],"class_list":["post-804701","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nfl","tag-bill-belichick","tag-nfl","tag-sports","tag-unc-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804701","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=804701"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804701\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/804702"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=804701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=804701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=804701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}