EXCLUSIVE: The house of former San Jose State College assistant volleyball coach Melissa Batie-Smoose was shot at on Monday evening in Scotts Valley, California, Batie-Smoose and native police have instructed Fox Information Digital.
Scotts Valley Police Division Captain Scott Garner instructed Fox Information Digital that officers have decided that the weapon used was a pellet gun, and it’s being investigated as an act of vandalism. The pellet has been recovered by police. No one was harmed and no suspect or motive has been decided. The investigation is ongoing.
“We’re following up with some neighbors simply to see what we are able to discover out,” Garner mentioned. “At this level, there isn’t any surveillance, there isn’t any leads, there isn’t any nothing. We’re simply going to do our due diligence to go and interview the neighbors.”
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Batie-Smoose’s contract with San Jose State expired on Jan. 31 after she was suspended from this system in November. Batie-Smoose beforehand filed a Title IX grievance towards this system over a scenario involving transgender volleyball participant Blaire Fleming. Batie-Smoose can also be concerned in a lawsuit towards SJSU and the Mountain West convention over the scenario involving Fleming.
No hyperlink between Monday evening’s incident and Batie-Smoose’s Title IX grievance, departure from this system and ongoing lawsuit has been decided by police.
Nevertheless, Batie-Smoose believes she was “focused” for it.
“I do,” Batie-Smoose instructed Fox Information Digital when requested if she believes incident was linked to the scenario involving SJSU and Fleming. “It may possibly’t be a coincidence I’ve by no means had this occur and in our neighborhood I talked to neighbors which have lived there over 10 years and never even a robber within the space not to mention somebody capturing at somebody of their home.”
Gap within the window of former San Jose State assistant volleyball coach Melissa Batie-Smoose after an incident the place her dwelling was shot at by, what police have decided, was a pellet gun. (Picture courtesy of Melissa Batie-Smoose)
Batie Smoose mentioned the incident occurred when she was in a digital assembly with members of the Unbiased Council on Ladies’s Sports activities (ICONS).
She was talking with the lead legal professional Invoice Bock and Mountain West Convention volleyball gamers concerned within the lawsuit. As they have been discussing the authorized battle and the NCAA’s new coverage concerning gender eligibility, she heard glass break in her dwelling.
“I hear this large sound and it appears like breaking glass and at first I used to be identical to ‘what simply occurred? The place did that sound come from?’ After which, as soon as it registered, I look over to the window and I see the bullet gap.”
Batie-Smoose mentioned she crawled on the ground behind her sofa and referred to as her husband, telling him to name the police. The pellet was shot on the window going through her yard.
“Police mentioned the shot needed to come from the road behind me,” Batie-Smoose mentioned, including that almost all of her neighbors weren’t dwelling when the incident occurred.
When Batie-Smoose was knowledgeable that police decided the incident was an act of vandalism as a result of truth the weapon used was, she referred to as the choice “loopy.”
“So as a result of it would doubtlessly not be a gun that it is simply thought-about vandalism despite the fact that it might probably hurt you?” Batie-Smoose mentioned. “That is form of loopy to me. Regardless, if an object at that power involves your head, you are going to be harmed. It is loopy to me.
“I do not know the way this will get downgraded to vandalism.”
Batie-Smoose mentioned she beforehand obtained hostile emails about her stance on Fleming and trans inclusion in ladies’s sports activities. She additionally claimed to have had in-person altercations with people in Santa Cruz and Scotts Valley who disagreed together with her stance.
“Folks acknowledge me in the neighborhood and I am in an space that is talking out and chatting with battle for girls’s sports activities, I am in an space with some crazies and I positively consider it was a goal on me for talking out,” she mentioned.
Batie-Smoose added that the entire coaches and gamers concerned with San Jose State’s volleyball program know her handle. Batie-Smoose joined this system in 2023, however is not ruling out people exterior of this system discovering out her handle through different means.
“I really feel this point in time individuals might come discover your handle fairly simply,” Batie-Smoose mentioned. “Have I put it on the market? No. However I am certain in the event you seemed arduous sufficient you possibly can discover my handle.”
Batie-Smoose has since left her dwelling and is staying elsewhere whereas the investigation continues.
Batie-Smoose has appeared on Fox Information applications a number of occasions advocating for the safety of ladies’s sports activities amid the continuing scandal with San Jose State.
Batie-Smoose was suspended from this system on Nov. 2 after she filed the Title IX grievance. The grievance included allegations that Fleming had conspired with an opponent to have former SJSU co-captain Brooke Slusser hit within the face throughout a match in October.
Common police safety was assigned to the staff and continued all through the season amid safety considerations, together with an incident during which Slusser was knowledgeable of a bodily menace to her security on Oct. 2, Fox Information Digital beforehand reported.
Each Slusser’s lawsuit and Batie-Smoose’s Title IX grievance allege that Fleming conspired with Colorado State volleyball participant Malaya Jones forward of the match between the 2 applications on Oct. 3. The grievance alleged Fleming offered a scouting report back to Jones to make sure a Colorado State aggressive benefit, and allegedly established a plan to arrange Jones with a transparent lane to spike Slusser within the face in the course of the contest.
The letter acknowledged that the convention’s investigation included interviews with coaches and student-athletes at each San Jose State and Colorado State. Nevertheless, the letter didn’t particularly state which people had been interviewed. The convention declined to supply any particulars on the people who had been interviewed when requested by Fox Information Digital.
Slusser’s legal professional, Invoice Bock, later offered a press release to Fox Information Digital insisting that the investigation had been “contaminated with bias.”
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“As a result of the MWC’s investigation was insufficient, and something however thorough, and since the MWC’s close-out letter is riddled with errors, the undersigned is issuing this rebuttal and calls for that the MWC instantly and publicly launch: (1) the investigative report ready by its investigator(s), and (2) all paperwork related to the MWC’s claimed ‘thorough investigation’ and upon which the MWC’s determination to not proceed additional was primarily based,” learn the assertion from Bock.
San Jose State can also be now underneath investigation by President Donald Trump’s Division of Training to find out whether or not Title IX violations occurred throughout Fleming’s tenure on the volleyball staff.
San José State College President Cynthia Teniente-Matson has instructed Fox Information Digital the college is ready to cooperate within the investigation.
Fox Information Digital has reached out to San Jose State to inquire for a press release concerning the incident involving Batie-Smoose’s dwelling.
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