Curtis Malone, founder and president of Washington-based AAU program DC Assault, was acquitted of one charge of second-degree assault Friday in Prince George's County District Court.
Malone had been charged in March after Steven DePollar, 39, a Bethesda-based AAU coach, alleged that Malone and two other men attacked him in the hallway outside the gymnasium at Oxon Hill High School during what was described as a "non-scholastic basketball event" February 19.
In ruling on the case Friday, Judge Joel Worshtil said he did not believe that DePollar could have positively identified Malone given "the speed of the melee."
Malone founded DC Assault with Troy Weaver in 1993. The organization's website describes its mission as "to identify top basketball talent, boys ages 8-17 in the Washington, D.C., Metropolitan area, and provide them with the opportunity to develop their basketball talents while fostering sportsmanship, leadership and academic excellence."
The program has produced nine McDonald's High School All-Americans, including former Georgetown Hoya Austin Freeman, but has -- like many AAU programs nationwide -- come under criticism for having undue influence over college basketball recruiting.
This was not Malone's first brush with the law. He pleaded guilty to one count of cocaine possession in 1991(he served three months of a five-month sentence), and also pleaded guilty to reckless driving and attempting to elude a police officer in 1994 (he received six months of unsupervised probation).
